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nau!razmir makes a strategic alliance with lastwall
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And then... ugh. Then he's going to take a break from worrying about GODS and POLITICS and go back to tinkering with his metamagic rods. Razmir is NOT A HAPPY RAZMIR.

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It's not that many days later when the embassy teleports into Lastwall and let the servants out of their Bags of Holding, having used Sendings to arrange a reception in advance. It is officially here to engage in business up and down the major rivers on behalf of a not-tremendously-important firm of Absalom bankers, and while it has security appropriate for bankers who have no intention of sticking around, the wizard who cast the Teleport does not, actually, head home when they head to the large house they're going to be staying, he instead casts Invisibility and follows the group.

(This is because he is a fifth-circle Razmiran Priest, and he and the various other priests mingled with the group are here to make sure none of the treacherous diplomats, half of them inherited from the old regime, betrays Razmir. Lastwall knows they're there, of course - it's not like Razmir would try to sneak them past his allies - but they still don't want casual observers to know that Razmir and Lastwall are talking.)

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The head of the diplomatic expedition calls himself Ferdinand von Falkenheim in Razmiran, and he is known to have arrest warrants out for him for fraud, forgery, seduction and impersonating a nobleman in six different countries and at least six different names. His publicly-known history began when he boarded an airship in Absalom dressed as a prosperous merchant and cursing his runaway slaves who had so left him alone, offering extensive financial help to those who would assist him in his difficulty. He spent the airship trip lavishly gambling and equally lavishly distributing his former owner's gold as tips to the staff, and the makeup covering his slave-brands did not, in fact, begin to fade before the ship landed in Isarn.

His alignment is Chaotic Neutral, he's widely agreed to be an excellent negotiator, and he has publicly sworn loyalty to Razmir under Zone of Truth possibly just because nobody else will take him.

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Lastwall, obviously, has a Security wizard with permanent See Invisibility stationed near the Teleport plaza, because they would like to have some idea who's entering their country, especially if they're fifth-circle wizards. A note goes out to everyone cleared to know about the cooperation with Razmiran that their diplomatic party contains an invisible fifth-circle wizard. The only practical effect of this communication will be that the Security in the room during the upcoming diplomatic meetings will be somewhat higher level than usual.

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...also, some people in Lastwall have heard of this Ferdinand Falkenheim person, albeit by a different name, and are not particularly pleased by his presence in Lastwall under diplomatic immunity.

(A different deceitful and treacherous diplomat would ordinarily be a potential asset, if negotiations were to go poorly, but Riudarure doesn't see a point in trying to turn Falkenheim; this would imply that he can be confidently pointed in a specific direction at all—though Razmir seems to think he has been. He will wait and see how foolish this was.)

(Riudaure really does not like Chaos.)

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A few hours after the diplomatic party arrives, a courier arrives to deliver an invitation to a meeting between the "bankers" and officials of Lastwall's "finance ministry", scheduled for the following morning.

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The 'bankers' are happy to accept the invitation!

(In between sweeping the house for listening devices and scry targets, putting up wards against burglars, unpacking, and heavily bribing any of the servants who came with the house.)

When they arrive the next day, they'll bring along secondary diplomats and scribes for various side notes, but the core group consists of Ferdi, a member of Razmiran's secret police to keep an eye on Ferdi, and someone Lawful Neutral, just so the Lastwallers aren't too uncomfortable.

(Ferdinand himself, as Lastwall can notice, is under six-ish Geas spells, not to mention other magical effects, none of which diminish his natural flair, nor his willingness to give expensive-for-a-non-adventurer and well-considered gifts to practically everyone he meets.)

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The headquarters of Lastwall's government are plain, plainer than the house the party is renting, and a far cry from the great palaces of Taldor or Cheliax or even Razmiran. Lastwall is a place dedicated almost entirely to the service of others, mostly far beyond their borders, and they are not poor, they are simply budgeting. There are, admittedly, people who argue that the impression they leave on foreign dignitaries ought to be a matter of greater concern than it is, but even so this would not extend to impressing the servants of the fake Lawful Evil god of luxury.

The room the meeting is in is in an outer wing of the government building, outside its Forbiddance; Razmir's people are not yet trusted with that password. It is, however, shrouded in a curtain of black mist that anyone reasonably knowledgeable of Golarion's magics would recognize as a Mage's Private Sanctum.

The leader of the other party introduces himself as Ernesto Zampetti, a middle-aged yet still-fit man of probably Andoren ethnicity, judging by his accent, and bald except for his mustache. He gives his title as Chief Undersecretary to the Tribune for Trade and Foreign Affairs, &c &c, and appears to be a Lawful Good cleric, though not a very powerful one. He's flanked by several junior diplomats, but the most notable person on the other side of the table is the red-haired half-elven sorceress who sits unmoving and says nothing through the introductions. Those well-acquainted with the affairs of Lastwall will recognize her as Veena Heilu, Lastwall's Precentor Martial for Magic, which is to say the commander-in-chief of all its military casters, though hardly the most powerful of them.

(Rank and level are largely decorrelated in Lastwall, except at the very top. Whether this is meant to be a lesson in humility or merely because those best suited for leadership are not necessarily those best suited to being powerful combat casters, their Goddess has not said.)

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...also Riudaure isn't going to miss this, though he's invisible and undetectable to anyone without considerably more magical power than anyone else present in the room possesses.

(The Lastwall side does know he's there, though.)

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"Greetings, from Lastwall, to the ambassadors of the Lord Razmir," says Zampetti. "We are glad you've made it, and though our nations and patrons be very different, we hope that we will find common ground for a productive collaboration.

"These proceedings are, of course, entirely secret, though we trust you were informed of that before arriving."

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"Of course, all of us were fully briefed," says Ferdi, offering a firm handshake and honest, steady gaze for the consolation of anyone who thinks he's bad at lying. "- Undersecretary," he says, "I was passing through the market and they had this at such a wonderful price I thought your wife might like -"

(it's a very tasteful imitation Cathayan statuette, exactly to his wife's taste.)

And he has presents for everyone! Favorite sweet candy! Favorite year of wine! Latest chapter of favorite serial!

And, given that someone in the room looks determinedly unbribeable, "- and please, don't ask," detailed copies of private orders given to a Chelish captain on the Molthuni border by his commander with exact troop numbers for his unit and instructions on how he should position them, for Veena Hailu.

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Lastwall's diplomatic corps has a policy about bribes: accept them graciously, put the money directly in the central coffer, and don't let them influence your decision-making in any way. This policy isn't followed perfectly, but Lastwall is a Lawful country and also a Good one.

For the moment, however, as far as Falkenheim is concerned, they all appear very bribed.

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Someone in the room is a little bit concerned about the amount of spying and/or mind-reading implied by the exceptionally thoughtful gifts, but talented diplomats for some reason seem to just know stuff like that, and their skills never do seem to extend to acquiring any useful information.

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"We have this," she says, the first words she's spoken in the meeting. "Thank you, nonetheless, for the corroboration."

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"The first item of business, unless you would like to begin elsewhere, is the proposed project to secure territory for and then construct a road from the shore of Lake Encarthan to one of the major Iomedaen fortresses defending the Worldwound. A detail which may have not been previously mentioned is that the county of Canterwall in western Ustalav is an informal client of Lastwall, and has asked for a guarantee that their independence will not be threatened by this project, which we are inclined to require of you before it proceeds."

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"Of course not," he says. "We wouldn't dream of infringing on Canterwall's rights, though we'll need to discuss the details of road security later so as to ensure they are compatible with them." He pauses. "The Furrows used to be prime agricultural land, and are now a haunted waste and a horror blighting the country. Milord the Living God feels that once transport to it is simpler and the persecutions of the present rulers ended" (count Neska of Barstoi, who made the Furrows, has won the enthusiastic approval of the Hellknight Orders and has banned arcane magic to boot; Countess Ardis would be more malevolent if she had the power to rule or any interest in doing so) "it may be worth the expenditure of Lastwall's resources to purge the undead from the region."

(Quid pro quo. We abandon any interest in your western allies, you kill the undead blocking our ability to govern northern Ustulav after we conquer it. You like killing undead, don't you?)

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And he had thought it was going to be hard to get Razmir to agree to Lastwall troops in his newly acquired territory. The problem being, of course, that Lastwall doesn't exactly have troops to spare for cleaning up Ustalav or keeping an eye on Razmir.

"Certainly," he says, "we would like to purge the undead of Ustalav. We would have done it years ago, except that our full military capacity is deployed at the Worldwound itself and is not, in fact, enough, to prevent the likely destruction of Golarion in thirty years or so unless something changes. Something such as, for example, the assistance of a ninth-circle wizard powerful enough that some consider him a god."

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And that is why Razmir can afford to make it contractually obligated to instead of stay out!. Because Lastwall will not, in fact, be able to keep a military force around, and will need to immediately send their troops off elsewhere as soon as the Furrows are cleared up, leaving Razmir to profit.

(Also leaving Ferdi to profit. It's amazing how cheap deeds to Furrows land are on the markets of Ardis.)

"Indeed," Ferdinand says politely. "It is often said in Razmiran that Lastwall is our shield against Abyssal horrors. Milord the Living God does no more than answer the pleas of His people, by lending his support to the defense of the Worldwound." That's our story and we're sticking to it. "No doubt He will be pleased when the King of Ustalav invites Him and the paladins of Lastwall in to resolve the nation's troubles." We can sort out mind controlling the king ourselves, we won't need your help for that.

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It seems to him that anyone who actually deserves to be called a Living God ought to be able to close the Worldwound in a day, although, on second thought, none of the actual gods have done anything direct about it.

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"We require only enough assistance that the situation does not get irreparably worse while some of our forces are diverted. I expect that a ninth-circle wizard ought to be able to do this quickly and at very little risk to himself—Lastwall will, of course, provide necessary material components." They have more money than combatants at this point; people are far more willing to donate the former. "If these general principles are agreed to, I will leave the details for a strategy meeting."

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He gives an honest smile. "The Living God does not intend to let Golarion be destroyed. He'll charge you a fair price, but He's not going to leave the world to rot, He's not Tar-Baphon. He has given His word that He can handle this, and will keep it."

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"If Razmir's plan includes any expensive material components which he expects Lastwall to pay for, then he ought to provide us with the details of such plan before a formal agreement is signed. In any case, I have prepared a list of options for temporary ninth-circle support at the Worldwound, from which he may choose, or he may submit to us his own plan, though I reserve the right to pass judgement on whether it will work." She doesn't at all expect this diplomatic party to be able to bind Razmir, personally, to anything, so there's no point going any further than that.

Her list of options ranges in audacity from 'just summon a bunch of outsiders' to 'exploit the well-known tendency of Wishes to create gigantic explosions'.

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Razmir was just planning on going for "summon lots and lots of outsiders, then sic 'em" as a strategy! He's prepared to Planar Binding as many cooperative angels as they can provide spell components and names for (within reasonable limits) during the specified period that their paladins are off working for them; absent Lastwall being willing to dump ridiculous quantities of incense on him, he'll just locate demon camps then Teleport or Greater Teleport implausible numbers (even for a master-conjurer) of moderately buffed summoned outsiders on them; they'll only stick around for a couple minutes, but during that couple minutes they can cause tremendous damage since they don't need to fear death.

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And then they can proceed with the remaining details of the arrangement. Lastwall's position on the remaining issues can be summarized as follows:

The Palatinate counties of Ustalav, which are democratically governed, mostly free of undead, and all have some kind of existing relationship with Lastwall, are to remain independent states under Lastwall's protection. Razmir can have the rest of the country as long as he doesn't tax the peasantry into starvation, force people to worship him (they will reluctantly allow him to accept voluntary worship), or violate any of several other humanitarian conditions which really should not be that hard to achieve although they mostly do not obtain within Razmiran's current borders. The mountainous wasteland county of Virlych is currently de facto part of Lastwall, although no one lives there (at least not if one defines 'live' in such a way as to exclude undead), but Razmir can have it too if he'd like to put the resources into cleaning it up—excepting, of course, the region around Tar-Baphon's prison, which it's Lastwall's sacred duty to guard.

They can also negotiate the exact cost-sharing plan and toll rates for the new road through Razmir's new territory, and make overtures toward free trade—they're open to it, of course, but they definitely don't plan to allow Razmiran 'missionaries' into Lastwall. This isn't even because Razmir isn't really a god; they ban all Evil churches.

They're willing to provide humanitarian aid to the people of Razmiran, in food and other resources, but on the condition that their own people distribute it, and that Razmir not raise taxes above their current level in response (as would be equivalent to him just taking Lastwall's money for himself, which isn't the idea).

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Razmiran does not want Virlych, and will fight over a few of the richer and more accessible palatines but not that hard; mostly just Ferdi using them as a bargaining chip so that he can yield them in exchange for concessions elsewhere. Razmiran reserves its fighting for making people worship Razmir; it is absolutely going to continue its religious policy (of 'the church of Razmir is the official state church, only worshippers get the goodies it provides, and worship of gods who do not recognize Razmiran is banned'.) It is persuadable to not literally put swords to the throat of people who refuse to worship Razmir, but is not going to allow clerics of gods opposed to Razmir to wreck Razmir's monopoly on divine magic. (Razmi's negotiators can be persuaded to yield on a few ridiculously minor terms - maybe allow Lawful clerics to practice in Razmiran if they swear an oath of fealty to the nation above their god and acknowledge Razmir's divinity, that sort of thing - but nothing that would ruin the monopoly.) Razmir is also fine with low tax agreements and humanitarian rules, though he obviously wants them all to have expiration dates in case the economy completely changes, and similarly for basically all other provisions of the treaty. He wants to keep his Lawful alignment, even if in a hundred years when everyone else is dead the entire population of his empire has moved to Ustalav for the guaranteed lower taxes.

Razmir is not prepared to sign a free trade agreement with Lastwall, because of the precedent, but his agents are prepared to work some clauses about providers of militarily relevant supplies into the Encarthan-Worldwound Transport treaty that is the fundamental baseline of their alliance, then stretch the definition of 'militarily relevant' to include a lot of staples and spellsilver.

And his negotiators are also fine with the provision of humanitarian aid, on condition that the people don't include clerics or equivalent sworn-servants-of-gods, they agree to follow the laws (with a few negotiated exceptions for laws like 'worship Razmir'), it is not just an excuse to spread propaganda against his regime, and Razmiran's hierarchy can deport individual aid workers who break the law or cancel the project if Lastwall double-crosses him / the situation completely changes in chaotic manner. (And Razmir's taxes are already inefficiently high, and he is prepared to not raise them while Lastwall is sending aid or up to X years thereafter. He's fine with that.)

Razmiran would also like to include a clause in the treaty vis-a-vis arcane spellcasters who are too evil for Lastwall to approve of being allowed to go free and too hard to imprison to instead be given the option of defecting to Razmir and be spared provided they serve Him loyally. (Methods of ensuring their loyalty are unspecified but almost certainly Evil.)

(It is also fairly clear that Razmir wants to get his hands on the treasury of Ustalav, whatever's in it, but this is less important to it - though it is very important - than maintaining the religious monopoly.)

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