"Of the known demon lords, Socothbenoth and Sifkesh seem to me the most likely, alongside Folca of the Daemon Harbingers. None are a perfect fit, however, and it also seems plausible to me that the count's patron is someone who tries not to appear in the pages of history at all, which would suggest they react very dangerously to people they know are investigating them."

What a concept. "I will try to act natural."

He nods seriously again.

"If you have further questions, while this sanctum lasts would be the ideal time to ask them, but otherwise I will take my leave."

"I don't know what sorts of questions you're ideal to ask! Why are you on this instead of Prelate Hulrun, I suppose?"

"The Prelate is a zealous man, but subtlety is not one of his strengths. He much prefers to bring hidden affairs to light than to act in the shadows, and while he excels at it, it's not what's called for here. Acting too blatantly before we know the full details is might put many people at risk, the count among them, and even if he does prove to be a conspirator instead of victim or tool of the perpetrator, moving against him without ironclad proof would involve overcoming severe pushback from the nobility. They do not care for consequences happening to one of their own, and the count's high station makes it a particularly difficult task."

"I suppose I've never heard anyone call Hulrun subtle. Is there some process I should be going through to verify your credentials? Do you have a public reason to be here? Will you be crusading with us?"

"There are a number of people who can confirm that there is an inquisitor by my name that matches my description, but if you need to confirm that I am he and that this mission is legitimate, you will have to speak to the Prelate. I believe I took sufficient measures that my arrival will not be noted, but if I am mistaken about that I would advise claiming that I was here asking questions about Nenio. There are other possible excuses, but for most it would either be unusual that I used a sanctum or might do an undeserved injury to your reputation, such as if it was suggested that I was investigating you. As for crusading... it is not typically an efficient use of Iomedae's resources that inquisitors fight on the front line, but if you wished my assistance in dealing with cultists and infiltrators, I would be willing to assist in that in between crises."

"Nenio is certainly a questionable sort of person. It's not a secret that my brother and I have no memory of how we wound up on this planet, so conceivably you could be investigating that if it's within your remit without it necessarily casting aspersions on our characters, though maybe it'd get fuzzy with a few layers of rumor. There does seem to be a high baseline rate of cultists and infiltrators about, so I'm sure it will be a load off my mind to have you available to consult if something looks fishy."

"Sensible. In that case, knight commander, I'll make the arrangements and inform the Prelate."

His hand comes up in a salute.

"It's been lovely to meet you as it can under the circumstances. Have a lovely day, Inquisitor."

"You as well."

His task accomplished, Liotr walks out the library doors; between his posture and attire, it would be very difficult to pick him out of a crowd as remotely unusual.

She goes over to (partially) brief Iskander and goes out to see what's up all over the place this morning.

People are finishing up their last minute preparations for leaving! Inevitably lots of stuff will still be forgotten or not finished in time, but most of them seem to at least be making an effort to minimize it. The new recruits are being drilled on marching, especially with having rotations of people on the lookout for trouble so demons can't sneak up on them en route as easily, At the center of the encampment are dozens of laden carts, though they don't seem presently attached to any animals, and unlike yesterday most of the crusaders she passes seem to be armed and armored. It's still not total coverage and there seems to be significant variation in their kit, but it looks a lot more like an actual army than it used to.

She hops around from place to place making eye contact and smiling and complimenting. If she's a figurehead for morale she's going to be good at it. Anyone need paper? Anyone want to drill swordsmanship with her?

Most of her soldiers aren't terribly literate or otherwise familiar with the uses of paper, but taking it as a good luck charm the same as her hats seems obvious enough, and the ones that are might use it for letters. The uptake isn't quite as good as with the hats, but coming from her is worth a lot. As she travels around the encampments outside of Kenabres, she can feel her fame continue to rise, but it's not the easiest task to sense the gains against the steady backdrop that has been rising ever since the queen first introduced her in that speech. By now hundreds of thousands of people across Avistan and the Inner Sea have heard her name, and for thousands of those her role more directly touches thinking of her is a daily occurrence. Neither total seems to show any signs of stopping, either, though the latter has slightly slowed.

Who is she looking to ask? None of the sergeants drilling new troops will gainsay her joining them, though they don't seem to expect it will offer much to someone of her obvious skills, while asking the officers would get her an enthusiastic acceptance from those who consider it a chance to show off, especially to her or their fellows. Baroness Gaunther is also findable, but determining how busy she is will require Kybele to pay a visit.

The Baroness is a good choice, since they already got underway before, and she wants to look in on all her senior staff while she's racing around the city anyway.

As long as Kybele is willing to wait a few moments for her to finish up, they can pick up about where they left off. This time, the Baroness is mixing her basic drills with some lessons on judging how good an opponent is at fighting from how they hold their weapon or shift their weight or position their feet. It's hardly foolproof, but sometimes those are all the warning you get that an opponent is out of your league and you need to get assistance or flee. Ideally she'd want a real master like Hulrun or Alexaera or the queen to help out here, since there are certain further similarities amongst sufficiently powerful fighters that she lacks herself, but even without that it should give a bit of warning on what to look for in the stance of an incubus.

It's really useful! And how does Gaunther think the troops are going to fare?

Less than ideally, at first; they'll do their best, but there's not really any other outcome when you put a bunch of green soldiers against demons. Even the good fights have casualties when there aren't enough veteran units to fold new recruits into. With any luck, though, they can exploit their superior numbers to make the first few real fights one-sided affairs, and by the time resistance stiffens the men will have had some practice not losing their head in a fight. Any soldier who makes it through their first few real scuffles intact has much better odds from then on.

"I don't suppose there are soft targets we should hit first for this purpose?"

"Some of the cultists who fled the city when you won at the grey garrison are probably still grouped up in large enough numbers to serve. It would require going out of our way, though, and delay the advance on Drezen."

"If we know where they are we could send some faster units on a detour."

"We could. There'd be a real risk to it, since if the demons do have any rapid response capability still available they could defeat any spread out units in detail, but much of the crusade's success is already gambling on the fact that they'll be disorganized and dispersed after this failure. The more elite a force we send, the less we'd loose but the less they'd benefit from being bloodied... hmm. Perhaps we should treat it as a learning experience for the officers. Yours, if you want it, but otherwise there are also some other people I could stand to see how they handle an independent command before too much is at stake."

"I mean, I don't exactly love the prospect but I don't love anything about there being an invading force of pure evil that I'm responsible for beating back, and I think it makes sense on a practical level! Should I run the idea by Irabeth? Or anyone else? I was given my staff's titles but not detailed job descriptions."

"It's my job to help you decide these, but also meeting with Irabeth would be sensible. As the one who's been running the city's defense she's likely to have a better guess about what you'd be getting into and what the surviving strength of the cultists in question is."