He does! This is convenient. "Hello! Given I've stopped my prior project, I was wondering if I could ask about an alternative I've come up with to see whether it's a more acceptable possibility to pursue?"

Well, it will be convenient for the moment, but having a templar follow you around indefinitely to make sure you're not doing dark magic may prove inconvenient in other ways. They're happy to listen to other project proposals, though. 

So, people (or at least, humans and ogres?) have some amount of natural resistance to the influence of dhar. So what if the Acolyte used his bullshit alien magic to just, take that natural resistance and turn it all the way up, all the way to total immunity if he can figure out how to do it?

That does not seem, per se, to be an issue, but there's the problem where finding people to test this sort of thing is hard. Witchsight is rare and it corresponds pretty much 1:1 to spellcasters. Hags and hedge witches can't be trusted, Ice Witches are assholes, and the Imperial Wizard's Charter forbids this entire class of speculation and experimentation. Maybe some elves could be found to help? But then you'd have to deal with elves, who are nearly as bad as the Ice Witches, and foreigners to boot. 

That is a problem. The Acolyte has a rudimentary sense for the texture of dhar taint, and it would probably get a lot more precise if he pursued that, but having to get everyone to take him at his word in this atmosphere of fear (and not an unjustified one) would be a massive hassle. He supposes he could try and research an expression of Determination that would let him give others his own sense?

Paladin, what if the Acolyte first developed his magic in such a way that it would let him have a refined sense of dhar, and then further developed it so that he was able to provide this sense to others?

Verifying that his capacity to perceive dhar is a correct perception of dhar sounds relatively easy to do (especially if he can perceive the other winds as well?), since imperial wizards are allowed to look at the stuff without violating their oaths, though when it comes to teaching his magic, they're still considering how to safely test what teachable knowledge he already gave them, so further teaching beyond that would also need to wait on that. 

Alright, that's understandable. He can't really distinguish the winds at this point, though he does have a general sense for magical-ness? And he can tell that apart from dhar. He'll need some time to refine both of those, so maybe in the mean time the Verenites could help him find a trustworthy mage who's willing to verify the accuracy of his dhar perception? Hopefully one who won't want to kill him, naturally. If there's more to do that they know of on the 'become legibly safe to various magical bureaucracies' front (other than foreswearing Knowledge, of course) he'd greatly appreciate at least knowing of it.

It would be possible to hire an imperial wizard or an ice witch to do the verification (expensive), or an elf-mage (very expensive, but much more skilled also). All much easier in Erengrad rather than Praag, since Erengrad is the trade city at the centre of the northern half of the continent and Praag is sort of just a waypoint on the silk road. Unfortunately most of the magical bureaucracies verify non-corruptness by watching members of their own tradition extremely closely and then trusting each other to be non-corrupt on the institutional level; there are lots of smallish untrusted or semi-trusted magical traditions throughout the world. If he performs a legendary deed saving hundreds of thousands of souls from the clutches of chaos, that sort of thing tends to go a long way. Also the more gods like him, the better. Magnus the Pious managed to have magic legalised in the empire at all by being the greatest emperor in the last millennia and having the direct and legible favour of the three more important gods of the empire (The Acolyte might have seen the Magnus memorial gardens in this very city, built to commemorate when he used all of this greatness of his to unify the peoples of the old world to save the world in general, and Praag in specific, from the clutches of the Everchosen). The college of elementalists was also granted a lesser charted by Dieter IV while he was in the middle of making all his other mistakes. It's worth noting that this involved dozens of their members being tortured to death in search for hidden corruption. 

How long would he need to save his dockwork earnings to afford either an imperial wizard or ice witch's verification, or should he work on finding some other work that is a bit more lucrative? Maybe he can talk to whichever ends up being easier to contact about working with them to build some institutional trust. Performing a legendary deed is maybe possible, if the opportunity arises, but going out and searching for it sounds more than a bit foolish, so doing things the slow way will probably be necessary.

Or he could go out into troll country or wherever and start his own petty kingdom, but the Acolyte doesn't have a tenth the talent or a hundredth the tolerance for leadership he'd need to make something like that work.

He'd have to save for years, probably. There are very few wizards and they're mostly hired to do specific jobs by aristocrats. There are plenty of people who go out searching for legendary deeds to do, though it does help to have a network for it; when there's a province-depopulating disaster (and several averted disasters of similar magnitude) threatening the empire every generation (and about the same rate of problems for every smaller state), it's not absurd for someone who tries and has the ability to find themselves staring down a waaagh or chaos warband, and medium-sized famous deeds lead to chances to do big-sized famous deeds. Starting your own petty kingdom for fame and power is traditionally done among the border princes, far to the south, if he ever wants to give it a go; Norscans are traditionally considered ungovernable by anyone who does not share their abominable faiths; even other chaos worshipers have trouble. 

Yeah he isn't actually seriously considering the petty kingdom bit, and that makes sense. Minor magic was pretty common back home but major stuff like Knowledge was not, and that seems to hold true here as well. Maybe it'd be efficient to trade magic for magic? But that gets back around to verifying the safety of his magic.

Well, it was pretty similar to what he was doing back before his tutelary brought him to this place. Adventuring seems like the most practical option yet again, somehow. Would his Verenite handler be willing to patch him into such a network, if possible?

Many people consider the safety of the magic to be much less important when it's aimed at the forces of chaos and destruction. The Verenites would be happy to set him up with a list of horrible gribbly things that their order would like destroyed, or to give him letters of introduction to one of the local churches or government institutions which are likely to be engaging the darker forces of the world. They'd do the same thing for Imperial, Southland, or Bretonian institutions, but the Acolyte doesn't seem likely to want to visit any of those, even if many southlands states would probably kill for the aid of one with his (claimed) skills. 

Well, as much as he is interested in making the world a better place, he's also trying to interface with its societies, so solo adventuring, as tempting as it sounds, is probably not the right choice. He'll take the letter of introduction, though he's nor really familiar enough even with local institutions to determine which would be best for quickly progressing to notable feats and subsequent recognition.

Unless he wants to join a religious order, probably he'll have a better time finding recognition with a secular ones. Does he want a letter of introduction for the local court (who are relatively powerful but also corrupt), a nearby boyar who actually gets stuff done but who isn't very notable in the grand scheme of things, or one aimed at letting him join the main force of Tsar Vladimir's campaigns to clear Kislev of monsters, where he will be one of many contributors to any battle he finds, but also beelining systematically for every major problem in the country? 

Hm. Working for corrupt courtiers does not sound like a good way to cultivate trustworthiness. The local boyar could work, but if the Tsar himself is already looking for monster-slayers that sounds the best shot of proving himself. He's not after personal glory, or at least not only glory, but also to prove himself an ally to those who fight Chaos. He'll take the latter of introduction, and also some instructions on how he might find his way to the Tsar.

There are numerous institutions with which he could ask in order to be filtered into, but this particular set of letters is intended for a boyar of Verenan faith who has an appointment as a commander of a regiment of the Tsar's guard, who will be able to see him set alongside whichever other mages are deployed with the guard, wherever the Tsar next chooses to campaign. If they're not on campaign, they're barracked in Kislev (the city), the capital of Kislev (the country), which is pretty much directly to the south of here, and if they are on campaign then that's still a sensible place to head to in order to link up with them. 

Alright! Finally, the next step forwards reveal themselves. The Acolyte will thank his Verenite liaison profusely, and then leave the city (with or without the liaison, if they choose to follow)...from the eastern gate?

He's going to try and find his way back to back to Klomm's camp let him know he's headed away from Praag. It might take a few days to get to the right area and then maybe another couple days to find his student, assuming he hasn't moved.

If he can't find him in that time, he'll head back to Praag, probably rest for a day, then actually head down the southern road towards Kislev City.

Klomm is no longer residing in his camp, but he is nonetheless easy to find, following the trail of crudely-destroyed trees showing marks of damage quite unlike the axes of the local humans to a small, crude, fort made of dragged-together trees alongside a small bridge similarly reinforced and blockaded with a single tree-trunk, positioned to be trouble for a human to move, but presumably not so for the greater strength of a troll. The top of the fort is decorated with half a dozen heads, mostly of goat or sheep-horned humanoids, but one is of a human, still wearing a helmet of the local sort, and another of a greenskin of some kind. 

"Klomm! It looks like you've been doing well!" The Acolyte shouts from just outside the fort. "Do you remember your teacher?"

Klom will wrench open his crude and heavy door. "Ah! Yes! Teacher! Good to see! Flames have been very good!" 

"I can see! I am proud of you for putting your Knowledge to so much use. Show me what you've been using it for these past few weeks, and let me speak to you of what I have done with my time in Praag."

Kolm has mostly been focusing on improving his flames, improving their strength and range as a weapon, and has reached the point where, with focus, he can slice through a sturdy pine-tree in a single cut, though sometimes it takes him a couple of attempts. He has also mastered the art of using flames for butchery, accessing a slightly more esoteric form of division by cutting animals he finds into parts, useful cuts, without the need for careful tracing of his cuts down the paths a knives or cleaver would take. This has also allowed him to build up a stockpile of pelts and skins, each removed more or less intact from the animal, which he lacked the finesse or patience to do previously. 

That's good progress! Perhaps not remarkable for a month of high-frequency usage in the early stages of development, but his dedication to it is commendable. The Acolyte will likewise exposit on his adventures in Praag, offering to give Klomm some tutoring in Power when he gets to the part where he teaches it to Duc. He also explains that, after he's done with this visit, he'll be headed south again, much further, and for probably quite a long while, because he's seeking to impress the Tsar, the leader of the humans in this land, so that the Tsar will help him teach more students and help him cleanse this land of dhar.

While he's explaining this, the Acolyte thinks about all the pelts Klomm is gathering, on top of the bridge taxes he's collecting, and will ask what Klomm's planning on doing with it all.

Klom doesn't really understand what the big deal about dhar is, but he does understand the impulse to get famous and have lots of respect and minions, so it makes sense the Acolyte is going to try and do that. 

Klom does not really have a plan for selling his loot. He has vague intentions to try and convert them into luxury goods at a local town, but none of them like or tolerate him, so that's a trial at the best of times; it took several months of threats and bargains to get his armour made, even as rough as it is. For now, he has plenty of shiny objects and a comfortable-ish house, so it doesn't really seem urgent. Maybe he should try and get a minion? There are goblins in the forest it'd be pretty easy to bully into working for him. 

The Acolyte will try and explain his issues with dhar, but he honestly hasn't really thought about how to put it into words. It is mostly an intuition, built from how he's seen other people think about it. He'll have a better idea of how to word it once he's done more research, probably.

That makes sense, the people, or humans specifically he guesses, don't seem to especially like other races, at least going from how the ogre quarter interacted with the rest of Praag. Still, with work it should be possible to start building trust with the locals, and once they do trust Klomm, trading with them, and thus acquiring luxury goods, will be much easier and faster. Trade and the profits it brings are a big part of why humans group together into villages and cities, after all. In particular, the Acolyte has also been recently informed that the Tsar is putting together a large and powerful group of fighters to start clearing the land of 'monsters', and while he's sure that Klomm could defend himself from a smaller group seeking to slay him, as evidenced by the heads he's decorated the walls with, he's worried that a larger force, especially one with experienced battle mages, might be too much for him, or even worse, that the group the Acolyte is joining himself might turn this way and they'd have to fight. He would be very sad if he had to fight Klomm.

So, overall the Acolyte is hopeful he can try and come to more harmonious terms with the locals and maybe absorb them into his little domain, especially now that he's got a little fort out here. If Klomm is willing to try, maybe they can both go out into the village and the Acolyte can mediate between them and Klomm?