"Well, if there's one thing that Mendev does right it's definitely party. Iskander, this is the league of the inspiring cart! We've got Elan, Jannah, and the little guy over here is Curl; they're good friends of mine. League, this is Iskandar; I ended up in the caves under Kenabres with him and his sister a few days back."'

"I keep telling you Seelah, I'm part of the houndhearts, not the league of the cart." Despite his complaints, Elan can't help but smile a bit when responding. "It's a pleasure to meet you."

"These sound like highly exclusive clubs." Do they do handshakes here?

Not usually, but they'll figure out what he wants... relatively quickly if he offers, at least for how tipsy they are.

"Oh yes, nothing but the cream of the crop of the crop crusaders here. Well, us and Elan, at least."

"Hey! Curl..."

"He's definitely got you there."

"Not you too, Jannah! Augh, truly I am assailed on all sides. "

"Ky says it's the done thing to go crusading with a party of adventurers while the army does army things, which kind are you guys?"

"Well, I'm stuck with the army for the foreseeable future," Curl offers, "But these clowns have their choice of it."

"We've mostly been doing independant patrols along the wardstone like, but I'm not sure that's practical if we're going to be operating inside the barrier," Jannah responds, choosing not to address the poke. "Without it zapping them, we'd have a tough time with succubi or worse yet vrocks. It might be a time for a return to normal army operations, and I mean there's no better time than the start of a crusade to shake things up."

"Normal armies good against vrocks?"

"Well, if you've got clerics or paladins at least. Normal attacks don't do much unless they're helpless and you can go for a coup de grace, but if you've got blessed arrows you can kill them while they're still flying."

"Oh, cool. I'll make sure Ky knows she needs to go heavy on the archer units."

"Hey, I'm beginning to feel ganged up on here. What's wrong with a nice longsword or two? Elan, back me up here."

"Look, I'm not saying I'd ever want to give up my sword. And I'm way better at taking down stunned demons than an archer, or at keeping them away from my allies, and I injure demons more heavily than an archer does. And those are all good! But for those of us not blessed by the goddess to be awesome at killing demons, there's a lot to be said for ganging up on them."

"Fair enough, I suppose you can keep talking about the benefits of archery."

"If blessed arrows are really expensive or something maybe fewer archers is better, what do I know."

"I think it's 50 arrows per sword? Something like that, at least. If you're fighting constantly you can get in more strikes than that with a sword before the duration runs out on the spell, but only one person can use a sword at a time."

"That is my understanding of swords." He makes a note of this.

That'll about exhaust their interest in talking practical matters, unless you count them bemoaning having to purchase new camping supplies after they abandoned their old set to return to Kenabres as quickly as possible or discussing in steadily less and less useful detail the feasibility of getting drunk safely on campaign.

Iskander drifts off.

Ky hands out paper stars and, after a flash of inspiration, copies of her hat - hers is woven and for her to make them quickly the copies can't be, but they can have the same color patterning on them - to anyone who seems interested, and listens for anyone with advice or questions.

People will absolutely take these! Some of them apparently brought rocks or trinkets for her to breathe on in the hopes of capturing a bit of her luck, but if she's taking the initiative to hand out items handmade by her own power most of those will be happy to take one instead, and she'll start seeing the hats on a smattering of heads in the crowd. She'll get people thanking her for saving the city, and telling her to give the demons a taste of their own medicine, and wishing the blessings of the inheritor on her, and in one case a small child asking her if she has a magic sword like all the statues of the goddess do and if so can he pretty please see it.

She does have a magic sword! She doesn't want to draw it right now but he can see the hilt.

He will be very begrudgingly satisfied with this and when his mother pulls him away he'll start enthusiastically swinging around his own imaginary sword.

Does he want a paper sword? Not as sharp as hers, but stiff enough to swing.

...nevermind she's back to being his favorite person again. Yes, absolutely he would.

Paper swords for all the kids who want paper swords!

A handful more who are nearby will absolutely take one, and she'll see a handful more trickle in as they presumably hear about her having them from the people she handed it out to. It would appear that someone making swords by magic is a real winner among that demographic, boys and girls alike, though some of them have to be dissuaded from immediately using them to try and fight each other.

After a bit more of this, Camellia stops by in a short lull between well-wishers.

"Knight commander, huh? Someone's moving up in the world; I'm pretty sure that ranks a poor benighted noblewoman like me. How's life at the top been treating you so far, now that you've got your well-deserved recognition?"