Like right now, for example: he is surrounded by demons. He does not know how he got to be surrounded by demons, with a splitting headache and a metaphysical chest injury of some description, but that sure is what's going on right now. And it's definitely demons, too. He knows his demons; devils would never be this disorganized, ever, and this is too gratuitously evil to be anything on the upper end of the alignment spectrum. He will not expand on the specifics of how he's aware of that one, but suffice to say that flaying says more than a thousand words.

Obviously he's attempting to get out of this location. He would like to, perhaps, get somewhere that there are less demons. He is not feeling picky enough to settle for 'no' demons, but less would sure be nice. They're kind of everywhere, here. He keeps having to kill them incidentally in his meandering towards a non-demon direction. Not because they've spotted him or anything, he's a rogue of above-average skill and stealth, but because they are literally, physically in his way, and he does not have the energy for acrobatics or overlong detours. Instead, some demons that are in his way cease to be alive. It's much simpler that way, though if he were in somewhat better condition he'd aim more towards being a shadow than being a shadow of death. As it is: yeah, no. He's too tired for any kind of proper cloak and dagger shit.

It's not clear how long he's like that, in his fugue state of pain and death and shadow, or how he... knows which way is the correct direction for Less Demons, Please, but. It does eventually get him somewhere that there are less demons. He's not quite up to no demons, but he gets to less. He doesn't have to kill as many, anymore. He even sees... what is that, greenery? Cool, living things that don't want him to suffer for eternity on principle, that's sure nice to see. You never know how much you'll miss grass until it's gone, and he's sure glad to have it back.

But it's obvious to even his addled mind that he can't keep at this forever, so: he's watching for something... not entirely unfriendly. Friendly would be nice, but he tries to at least pretend to be realistic when he's on searching for needles in demon swarmed haystacks, thank you. He eventually finds something promising. That something is an ambush. Not involving him, for once, just what looks... vaguely like a patrol... getting ambushed by what are definitely demons. Yeah, close enough, he'll take it.

The ambush then involves him, in that he kills six demons before anyone's even aware he's there, and then two more after. Then he stands there, a little listlessly, attempting to pick out the very frightened (non-demon!) figures in front of him. They seem... a little freaked out. He should probably say something. Something clever, something reassuring.

".... Paladin," he pronounces accurately, at one of them. Let's see, how does one quickly and succinctly reassure a paladin in a demon infested wasteland...

"I surrender," is the obvious answer, and he drops the weapons he stole from demons and promptly loses the will to stay conscious. He would like to make this someone else's problem right now, thank you.

"Well, you heard the man."

     "You're not funny, Lefa. What the Hells was that?"

          "How'd he know I was a paladin??"

"Could've been aura sight. Could've been the holy symbol. Could've been you healing Rian, with the glowy hands and all."

          "...I did heal Rian, didn't I."

     "You did. Can we discuss the terrifying murder-shadow that has just surrendered to us."

"I don't really see what's complicated about it. He's surrendered. He's unconscious, even. We tie him up and bring him into the city."

     "And if he's a demon trap and he explodes into a thousand nabasu the second he's within the Wardstone barrier?"

"...you raise a compelling point."

          "I'm not detecting Evil."

     "As we all know from the Prelate's regular lectures, no demon has ever learned to conceal its aura, or enchant a mortal who didn't happen to be Evil, or-"

          "If he was full of demon eggs he'd look Evil!"

"Eggs?"

     "Did you hear anything I just said?"

          "We can't just leave him in the middle of the Wound, that's against the Treaty and my Code."

"Can't we bring him to the gates and have some bigshot cleric come out and blast holy light into him 'til it shines out his arse?"

          "That's disgusting. You're disgusting."

"I didn't come up with the mental image of a man stuffed full of demon eggs."

     "Lefa, shut up. Milos, shut up. Lefa, that was actually a decent idea, everything else aside. Let's bring him to the gate and call in that we've got a man who might be a demon trap but might need help."

"And tell them not to call Hulrun."

     "No. This is the man's job."

          "...tell them not to call Hulrun unless absolutely necessary? You realize he's just going to want to set this poor bastard on fire and have done with it."

     "...I'll tell them to call Lady Terendelev too."

Cool, cool, doesn't look like he needs to defend himself. His plan was definitely a good one, and he is so good at problem solving. He made good choices.

Their terrifying murder-shadow is remarkably light, and currently both unconscious and seemingly harmless! He does not seem to be filled with any kind of demon eggs, either. With the weapons dropped, he's unarmed and unarmored, and looks kind of like a dead man who's already been efficiently looted. What clothes are left (loose, open shirt, tight pants, and barefoot) are dark enough to confuse whether his fair complexion is something in the gothic aesthetic, or if he's sick. Possibly the answer is both. Either way, he's got dark circles around his eyes, like he hasn't slept in months or like he's been attacked by makeup artists that are highly opinionated about eyeliner. Again: it's not clear which.

"Hello the gate! Please go fetch the Prelate."

     "And Terendelev."

          "...no? Why?"

               "This man killed eight vrocks in three moments, verbally offered surrender, and then fell over. If he's a demonic trap he's a very clever one. I'm prepared to swear paladin's oath, and you can hit me with whatever enchantment dispel you like."

          "Wait one moment, please."

The Prelate arrives first. He looks less happy with this situation than he is with most situations. (And if something can be described as a situation, he isn't happy about it.)

He registers, vaguely, that things are happening. There is some sort of leader person showing up. Or something. He should. Probably. Do a thing. Be conscious. Something.

“… hold on,” he mutters, stirring at the commotion. “Did I get mugged…? Thought I was past that kind of shite….”

Hulrun's lip twitches, either with amusement or contempt. "No one is past being caught by surprise. It merely takes a higher caliber of surprise."

Idly, he tries a minor curing spell. The lightest touch of healing can invigorate a victim interviewee, if they lie close enough to the brink.

“Damn it, they took my boots, those’ll be a bitch to replace…” he continues, then stirs at the cure spell. “Oh. Thanks. Think this is a… restoration thing… not a healing thing. Helped with the headache though, appreciate that.”

"Hm. I'll leave it to the Lady, then... diamond dust isn't so plentiful as it could be. And you look like they took more than your boots."

“Yeah, I’m getting that impression. Did you take my weapons?” He sounds oddly hopeful about this. “Wait, no, I stole the ones I was using, didn’t I. Shit. I am going to have to go on a quest to find that fucking sword again…”

Eyebrow. "It'll be quite a quest. The Worldwound is not exactly a goblin hovel... and you had best hope whatever took it didn't make it back to the Abyss itself."

It takes him a second to put this together.

“….. to the… you have a hole. To the Abyss. Of course you do. Why wouldn’t you. What else did I expect.” He snorts a half laugh of something like despair. “Other way around, I think, mugging was…. probably in Abyss. So. Yep I’ve got a quest.”

Hulrun does not frown any further, on account of how he is already frowning quite hard.

"Your implication that you came here through the Worldwound does not inspire the utmost confidence."

“Yeah. Sorry. Still time to stab me if you want to, but then someone else’ll need to go fetch the evil sword…”

This is, of course, when Terendelev arrives.

“Evil… sword???” she repeats, slowly.

Hulrun nods. "The story this gentleman presents is that was 'mugged', staggered through the Wound proper, made it here - reports are that he slew eight vrocks in three moments, I will refrain from comment on the veracity of said reports - and now needs to find an 'evil sword'. Along with other equipment, including boots so notable he brought them up before his need for Restoration."

Well, it sounds dumb when put like that. In his defense, they’re really nice boots.

“…. Yep, pretty much. Also, I don’t know the specifics of the mugging, probably some magic mind shite going on there or something.”

Terendelev usually does not agree with Hulrun’s assessments, but, well. A broken clock is right twice a day, she supposes.

“I… see,” she says delicately, considering what exactly to do with. … this.

Hmm. It’s well known that, as a silver dragon, she can Detect Evil at will. But she has had rather a long time to learn more tricks than just the ones her pedigree allows for, and if this person is what he claims to be, and as powerful as that implies, then a Detect Good will be harder to spoof.

The silver dragon stares.

“…. Prelate, his aura of good is. Stronger than mine,” she says, a little faintly.

Prelate Hulrun stops looking at the man on the ground in front of him. He also stops looking at Terendelev.

"What was the gift that you presented me with upon my return to service following the Third Crusade?" he asks. "While speaking, produce a fully detailed illusion of the Redeemer's Basilica, with frescoes as they were the last time I visited the Queen, using only Silent Image."

(If Terendelev has been ensorcelled, it is very nearly useless to use the basic anti-enchantment tricks that are available with no preparation. Any caster who could catch her would obviously be using a spell that can command her full abilities. But forcing someone to use up as much of their mental leeway as possible has been known to buck the hold of stronger enchantments as well... occasionally.)

“A cloak of resistance that was only the deep blue of the Mendev flag, because I felt that after the third crusade we’d all seen quite enough crimson.” She produces the requested illusion, frescoes and all while saying this, though once she’s gotten the details right she rolls her eyes. “If I were enchanted, the smart thing to do would not have me standing indulging you, it would have me charging alone to the Worldwound insisting that there is an evil there that only I can defeat, to be swarmed by demons and assassinated, where my body couldn’t be retrieved. The man wanted a Restoration, was it?”

She then casts its older brother, Greater Restoration.

It helps. A little. The sharp pain in his chest is lessened, at least. It’s not entirely gone, and without the pain to disguise things, he can feel a deep hollowness in him that can only mean he’s in some deep shit this time.

“Thank you,” he says anyway, and then he stands. Gingerly, and like he’s likely to fall over at any moment.

Hulrun rolls his eyes right back at her. "And if your response had been not indulging me but charging into the Wound, I would have concussed you as necessary, but some foes are more subtle than that."

(She is not off the hook yet. She probably knows that.)

He turns back to the man. "Would you care to explain your alignment aura? ...and give your name, please, I'll be filing a report."

(She does. She does know that. Sigh.)

"Veron Chandler. Uh. I. ... Try to do good when I can???"

He has no idea how to explain himself. This is usually Deekin's job, and Deekin is absent. Without Deekin, he'll go with shrugging helplessly.

Hulrun pinches the bridge of his nose very gently. (He's wearing gauntlets. You can't be too forceful about your demonstrative gestures, with gauntlets.)

"An alignment aura is a factor of three possible variables," he recites. "One is species; undead, aligned outsiders and dragons have exaggerated auras, due to their status as beings of an alignment rather than possessing that alignment. The second is divine power; those favored in certain ways by the gods hold a splinter of that god's divinity within themselves, which overpowers their own aura entirely. Finally, for someone in possession of neither of these characteristics, general puissance can force a much less firm and reliable reading. For someone who tries to do good when he can to have a stronger aligned aura than a mature silver dragon empowered in her own right by the Inheritor... is somewhat implausible."

"... I've gotten a lot of chances to do good lately???" he says, a little helplessly.

"Could you, perhaps, give an example."

"Uh. Okay. .... So, you know Mephistopheles?"

"Lord of the Eighth Circle of Hell, archdevil second in power only to Asmodeus himself. That Mephistopheles??"

"Yeah! Him. He had a plan to," he waves his hand vaguely, "conquer my home plane to make it the tenth circle of Hell or whatever. So. I didn't let him."

If Hulrun had a more expressive face, it would be communicating some very complicated emotions. As it is, he mostly just looks the same amount of suspicious and grumpy that he already was.

Terendelev's face is perfectly expressive, but nonetheless, it cannot do this situation justice. This calls for a facepalm.

"Uh. There was also a guy stuck in the evil sword? Enserric. I helped get him out? He's in a golem now."

"Thank you, your first example was very illuminating."

Stiff nod.

(Theories that actually make sense of the situation are in short supply right now. "This man is telling the truth" doesn't even, really, do that.)

It really doesn't!!!

"... The Greater Restoration didn't entirely fix you. Did it," observes Terendelev, because even though this situation is entirely inexplicable, she's still capable of making observations about people. And this man does not quite look entirely well.

"No, but it really helped! Thanks. Uh - diamond dust was it..?" He moves to reach to where his bag of holding is, and it's definitely not there. Neither is his portable hole. Damnation. "I will pay you back when I have money again. Uh." He should probably not start summoning shadows right now, while these two people are still very freaked out and not used to him yet. ".... Is there any miscellaneous adventuring you might need doing."

"We'll. Let you know if something comes up. Don't worry about it for now."

The number of miscellaneous adventuring tasks he is inclined to trust this man with is few to none.

Yes, that too, but they will not be saying that out loud, thank you Prelate. Anyway, Terendelev suspects that this person will somehow find some sort of problem to solve anyway, without their involvement.

"We're in the middle of a festival. Why don't you, um. Just go and enjoy the sights for now?"

Please go away and stop being their problem, this was supposed to be a nice party.

"Yeah. Sure. .... do you have any recommendations for where I could find shoes."

"Joran Vhane is probably still working, I've seen the man voluntarily leave his forge about half a dozen times since we've met. Try him."

He gives an address in the merchants' quarter, which is a bit out of the way of the festivities.

"Great. Thank you. Sorry about the fuss."

He will in fact go away and stop being their problem.

The mature silver dragon who has been empowered in her own right by the Inheritor is just going to take a moment to stand there, next to Prelate Hulrun, quietly going what the fuck.

".... so, are you... having someone follow him, or...?"

Because obviously Hulrun is going to do something, she'd just like to be somewhat aware of what. ... He's not going to tell her here, is he. What a silly thing for her to ask, of course he's not. Sigh.

Eyebrow.

(Preceptor Archons are not cheap, by the standards of Heavenly labor, but they make nearly unparalleled spies. He will probably need to do something terrifically annoying to appease them. Once, a trumpet archon demanded as payment that he attend one of Count Arendae's parties and not raise his voice for the duration.)

(He decided he did not need a trumpet archon on that occasion.)

Yeah. Yeah, she's not even sure why she asked.

"Right. Of course. Try to enjoy the festivities, Prelate."

Because she needs to go dig up perhaps a dozen scrolls of various things for breaking enchantments and buffing spell resistance and whatnot. And then still, somehow, attempt to actually have fun at a party.

"No."

This is the only order Terendelev makes of him that he is consistently willing to reject.

Right, so, Veron will go check in with that guy they recommended. Eventually. But since he did just get mugged, this is a situation for backup gear. Which he has, and can acquire without too much trouble, because he's a professional, thank you.

First, though, he should make sure he's not being followed by anything he doesn't approve of. Since, again, he did just get mugged. This involves a complicated series of twists and turns and doubling back and shadowstepping and walking through an appropriately dusty area and then through those little fluttering bits of confetti and then through standing water puddles and then in a little tiny nook that cannot be reached by air and then -

"Oh. Hey. Archon?" he confirms, squinting at a place in the air that looks completely ordinary to people that are not really really good at this.

The first step of being an even vaguely competent spy is not reacting to this in any way.

Except by Greater Teleport to a different, equally completely ordinary place in the air.

"... That's fair. One moment, lemme find you again..."

It is now time for That Nonsense, Again. More efficiently this time, because he knows what to check for instead of checking everything possible.

Then:

"Yeah, you seem archony. Can I request a confirmation of being on the same side? If you're upper-plane aligned then I'm fine with you following me around, just, you know. Demons. Everywhere."

Veron experiences the distinctive sensation of being inside a Magic Circle against Evil.

"Ah! That'll do, thank you."

For politeness' sake, he himself steps out, and then back into, the Magic Circle. See how not evil he is.

The important part is if the (probably!) archon can do it too. Yes?

It takes the archon a moment to realize what's going on. Then there's the mental sense of a beleaguered sigh from nowhere in particular.

You realize that if I have even the most rudimentary illusions, it says telepathically, that test would be meaningless. My demonstration was the spell itself. Which demons cannot cast. ...except by trickery... damnation and hellfire.

It becomes visible. Its head is that of a great gold-and-white raven, and it is cloaked in feathers. "This is a farce," it says. "Do you have holy water?"

"Nope, none at all. But this is enough for me, no one evil would have put up with my shit for so long. Keep up the good work, but remember next time to let the breeze blow you around a bit more. You lawful types are always so starchy about tailing people..."

He will politely wait for the archon to re-invisible before he resumes his day.

The archon returns to invisibility and does not waste time being annoyed with an ally-in-principle. (Data it can gather from here on out will not be as valuable to the Prelate as unobserved intelligence. However, it is not at all unaware that Veron could very easily have pretended not to have noticed it. That, too, is information.)

Yep! It sure is!

Cheered by that delightful interaction (how long has it been since he's gotten the chance to play a friendly game of hide and seek?) he then finds himself a dark, shadowy, private (except for the invisible archon) corner to do his shadow summoning in. In retrospect, he maybe should have warned the archon about how, no really, this is fine, but, well. Call it professional pride. He's not going to break someone else's stealth just to reassure them. That would be rude. He's a rogue! He will treat friendly rogue-alikes as he would like to be treated. That's just polite.

Also, the cloaked shadow that forms into the shape of a very tall person very thin person with too-long arms is Neutral Good. Not the overwhelming aura that Veron himself is, but. Certainly notable.

"Hey, Ksxksskrth," he says the name easily and with a perfect accent. "I'm going to need my backup gear, please."

He is given the most deadpan, judgemental look that a faceless cloaked shadow with ominously glowing eyes could possibly manage.

"Do you," murmurs the shadow, in a language more common on the Plane of Shadow.

"Yyyyyyep, uh. I got mugged. Sorry," says the terrifying rogue who summoned him, sheepishly.

Sigh.

"..... Very well."

The shadow disappears, and in its place is a bag.

Wince.

"Yeah. Heard that loud and clear. 'I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed...'"

Anyway, he will get to putting on the aforementioned backup gear now. So he will feel slightly less naked. Heh, this is a bit nostalgic, half of this is old stuff that he swapped out of when he found better items. Look! His Boots of Striding and Springing! And all of the spider blood has been removed! He didn't think it was possible! Ksxksskrth can truly perform miracles.

- Catskin leather (+1 AC, +5 competence bonus on acrobatics checks, no maximum dexterity bonus cap, and one 'get out of death free' special effect) (Not made out of actual cats, yes he checked)
- Belt of Dexterity (+4)
- Dungeoneer's Cloak (Resistance 5 to all elements, +15 to trickery) (He does not by any stretch of the imagination need the bonus to trickery)
- Amulet of Natural Armor (+5)
- Commander's Ring (+2 Deflection AC, +2 to all saving throws, Cast Knock three times per day, activatable 15m light) (the light has never been turned on since he got it)
- Ring of Regeneration
- Bracers of Armor (+5 AC) (Replaces the AC from the catskin leather armor)
- Boots of Striding and Springing (increase movement speed by 10ft, +5 competence bonus on acrobatics checks) (Replaces/is the same as the catskin leather armor)
- Several potions and scrolls of varying types and quality, some of which are healing.
- +2 Shortsword, cold iron
- Dagger, adamantine, masterwork

So, now that he's no longer completely without any kind of gear on, now he can go visit the guy that those leadery people said he should talk to. Not about boots (well, not unless they have boots of haste) but maybe about something for protection from evil or charm spells or whatever. And a place to buy scrolls and wands and more potions. There's some money along with his backup gear; it's not enough for any particularly fancy shopping, but he can do some. Probably.

If any shops are... open... during a festival. Which. Probably not. Damn it.

...there's an odd insect crawling over his new boots. It tries to rip open the leather, and manages to scuff it despite the enchantments, though not to do any serious damage.

There's actually a few of them. More than a few.

The archon's invisibility dissipates as it raises its beak to the sky. It speaks with a calm, clear and pleasant voice, louder than an infernal war engine, a cone of warping air heralding its words:

"DESKARI APPROACHES! PROTECTORS OF KENABRES, PREPARE FOR BATTLE!"

This call echoes through the streets, which are rapidly filling with more and more of the little demonic locusts. Also, actual demons.

"Figures," sighs Veron, who really shouldn't have expected anything else. He doesn't know or possibly remember who 'Deskari' is, but it's probably not at all good.

Okay, uh. Where exactly is this 'Deskari' approaching from? Is it towards the insects? It's towards the insects, isn't it. Yay.

Well, it might be through the terrible rent that has just been torn in the sky above the town square. The one with the horrible locust fiend pulling himself through.

Not coincidentally, yes, the locusts are going thataway.

Yeah, that's. That's about what he thought. He wasn't expecting something quite that ugly, but. Yeah. Sure. Why not. He will get into position and attempt to -

- He is interrupted by a great silver dragon, shifting to her true form and taking to the sky.

"Deskari! Begone from my city - !"

While still in the air, Deskari sweeps his scythe in a broad, lazy lateral stroke; still, it hits Terendelev with enough force to send her severed head flying into a nearby building.

He allows her corpse to land, then perches almost daintily atop it, his leg-hooks punching through her scales to find purchase. "Not until I am done with it."

So, for the layman, the obvious thing to do is to attempt to kill the big monster. Which, yes, would be great and all, if it succeeded.

But the problem is with that 'if.' In Veron's professional lost person opinion, he doesn't think he can pull that off in a couple rounds. He has some truly impressive sneak attack damage, but it can only go so far, and that guy just one shot an ancient silver dragon. The thing about being a rogue is that if he can't end it in a couple rounds, and is by himself, that's kind of it. He's missing a proper party with which to tackle this, uh, mega powerful demon guy, which means he'd be tanking hits all by his lonesome. He is many things, but 'sturdy' he is not. And what matters more than this one singular battle, or big dramatic rogue sneak attacks, is making sure all of the powerful people on his side stay on his side. Which is to say: making sure their bodies are recovered, so they can be fixed back up again. He would rather make sure Terendelev can be raised over maybe, but probably not, killing Deskari in a very stupid grudge match.

Besides, if his feel for how this guy works is right, he can't stay on this plane for particularly long. So: stop him from stealing the corpse of a dragon to do nefarious things with, which is the obvious thing for this guy to do. Show up for five minutes when you can break the rules, kill dragon, steal corpse. Turn corpse into horrific mockery of the hero that once inhabited it, with her soul probably tortured inside it or some bullshit. Profit, or something. Classic evil bad guy stuff.

So the real thing for a rogue of his caliber to do is to steal the corpse first.

This is a little bit complicated by how Deskari is, you know, standing on her corpse, and how her head's gone, uh, somewhere, but what's life without a little bit of complication. Not his, that's for sure.

He retrieves the head first, because that's simplest when he's still hidden from view and Deskari thinks his victory is complete or whatever. It would have been faster with his boots, but whatever, fine, he'll burn precious moments of shadowstepping on this, it's kind of important. Terendelev's head can be neatly stuffed into the bag that was once for backup gear, and then it's on to the more difficult task. Hmm, how to steal a gigantic dragon corpse out from under a demon lord guy...

It does, actually, involve attacking him. Not really to do damage, though that'll definitely happen, because: sneak attack. But the damage is incidental, the purpose is to prevent counterattack so he has just a smidge of space to do the real work. Some say his blades can be, hm, confounding? Was how it was put? Anyway.

Was Deskari expecting a sneak attack? No? Well, too bad, because Veron's ability to stealth is 'yes' (+49 to all stealth rolls, when not accounting for any gear or other buffs, which he did stop to do first, thank you) and so he can sneak up on this guy anyway. So Deskari gets to experience a truly splitting headache, courtesy of a dual wielding hasted (via scroll) mythic level rogue who did in fact take the feat 'hammer the gap,' and whose sneak attack dice are almost, but not quite, in the double digits. Also, Deskari cannot make attacks of opportunity for the next several seconds. Oops. Accident, really. Who just stabbed him? Who knows, someone has hide in plain sight and attacked from a shadowy corner. Okay, bye.

Then he takes the round of Deskari not being able to do shit to get close to Terendelev's corpse, and use his shadowdancer nonsense to unceremoniously shove it into the Plane of Shadow. Look, it's not exactly safe there, but it's safer, so. Better than leaving it with this guy. This would normally provoke an attack of opportunity, because it's a spell-like ability or some nonsense, but: that was why that attack earlier, actually.

This complete, he gives the demon lord or whatever he is a cheerful salute before he disappears into the darkness this time. Pleasure doing business with you, don't try to play the player!

Deskari makes a sound when the sneak attack connects. It has no comparison point. If anything else sounded like this, the unique and piercing horror of it would be lessened. And this cannot be any less than the worst sound that could be made, because if anything was worse, the goodness of the world would no longer be enough.

But Veron makes his will save, so whatever.

Deskari is unable to make attacks of opportunity. But what he can do is ready an action, and he does that, and when Veron salutes him, his scythe flashes down into the ground, and a chasm is opened up. Almost to the wall of the city, where there was solid earth there is now air - not air. There is nothing, because the air had no chance to filter in. It sucks Veron into itself on a purely physical level, but more insidiously, it sucks him in metaphysically. This is what happens, when Deskari, Lord of Locusts, makes it so; his blade, Riftcarver, knows your fate.

Does it, though? Does it really? Because Riftcarver's master saw Veron for just the briefest of moments, it's pretty implausible to expect he, let alone his weapon, knows his fate. You can't fool him with your intimidation tactics, thank you. This is more of an impotent temper tantrum than a proper counterattack, really.

Unfortunately, this particular tantrum doesn't allow for a reflex saving throw to avoid the area of effect entirely, but that doesn't really make it any less impotent. See, he is himself, and the +5 competence to acrobatics check given by his gear is mostly just superfluous. So: yes, fine. This rogue is going down in a literal and physically downwards direction. But that's kind of it, he catches himself on the rocks quick enough to avoid any real damage from the fall. So, uh, good job, Deskari, you just gave the shadowdancer that stabbed you a lovely dark rift full of shadows. That would be perfect to hide in. What an impressive closing move in this short battle in what's likely going to be a very long war. Truly inspired. Okay, now go away back to the plane you're bound to, the rules of the multiverse say your time on this material plane is up.

He'll check through the carved rift for survivors, though. He doesn't regret anything exactly, securing Terendelev's restoration was almost certainly worth the incidental death and destruction, even if it pains him, but, well. He's vaguely responsible in a sideways fashion if you squint, and so he'll happily assist various survivors that were unluckily caught in the wake of metaphysical giants having a pissing match. While he's here. Low hanging fruit, and all.

There's this paladin who fell about twenty feet away, picking herself up and dusting off her armor pretty nonchalantly, until she notices the woman next to her, whose leg has been pinned by a large rock. "Shit!" she says, rushing to try to lift it away.

"Careful," he says, and the way he seems to materialize out of nowhere is neither magical nor on purpose, "get proper leverage first, jostling it there would redistribute the weight wrong and make it harder to get her out."

Not that she can... see that... because she is human and humans do not usually have darkvision. And this is very, very dark. Right. Uh.

"Here," he says, passing over one of his rings instead of waiting for any reply. "It'll light when you twist the thing around the gem. I'm going looking for anyone else."

And then he's off to go check for more survivors without so much as a 'how do you do.'

???

?????

Here's a survivor. She's a few minutes down the path, even for his shadowstep. By the time he reaches her, she's already taken stock. She's crouching by a badly wounded man; he broke a number of bones in the fall, and he's crying. Her eyes are warm, but not merciful. Loving, but not kind.

"You won't survive your wounds," she whispers, holding a knife to his throat. "But you can take heart, that your death will be beautiful. It will mean something. That, I can give you."

"Nope!" says Veron, who will not be allowing this nonsense, thank you. "Nope, none of that, your knife privileges are hereby revoked."

This survivor's knife: is Veron's now. He's not going to turn down a free knife, even when it's not even a masterwork, who do you take him for.

Her eyes aren't warm anymore, really. They're hot. Her smile has gone maniacal.

The silver snake-spine amulet around her neck writhes, taking on ectoplasmic flesh, uncoiling and falling to the ground and growing until it's an enormous silver-and-black constrictor.

She, meanwhile, is suddenly wielding an enormous ghostly axe, one that her slim arms certainly shouldn't be able to heft as casually as they do.

"Mireya will feast, then," she sings.

Wow, okay.

".... none of that, either," he says, but this sure is a 'roll for initiative' situation now, isn't it.

She's a divine caster of... some kind, druid-alike or something maybe, without the shapeshifting, but, uh. Caster. In melee. With him. The shadowdancer. In the dark. She was smart enough to open with a buff to her own melee abilities, but there was really only one way this was going to go.

(If it's any consolation to Camellia, she did in fact do more damage to him than Deskari himself. Mostly because he opened with a disarm instead of a proper murder attempt, but still. It counts!)

"Hey there, sorry about that," he says, over her rapidly cooling corpse, with all of the casualness of a man who's been at this for arguably a decade. "I'm here to help. I've got a healing potion," several, actually, and he's probably just going to use the light wounds one on this guy, "anything broken?"

The man looks at him with the very mixed expression of someone who understands that being sarcastic to the man who just slaughtered some kind of snake-witch and saved his life is both rude and a bad idea, but would definitely otherwise be saying take a wild guess.

"Yes," he says eventually.

"Right, dumb question, sorry. The murder lady threw me off a bit. Where...?"

He will, carefully and efficiently, make sure bones are set before he gives this guy a healing potion. Which might make this guy wish the snake-witch of some kind actually had killed him, but, well. He will live! And soon enough, when his limbs won't be permanently twisted by the healing, he gets a potion! (It's cure medium wounds. Because he's a softie.)

Fortuitously, he falls unconscious after about the third bone. But he can be shaken back to life and drink the potion, and he's very thankful.

He is happy to help, and points the guy in the direction of where he left the paladin with his ring. He'll swing back around to her to retrieve it, after all, and it's a good idea for the survivors to get all organized and whatnot.

Then he's off to see about getting more of those.

By the time he circles back around to Seelah and Anevia, he has sent them a somewhat motley group, retrieved from lots of weird places that are hard to get down or the like. There are a number of injuries, but anyone that had been in critical risk isn't anymore, and all broken bones have been set and splinted, if not healed.

"Hey," he says casually, materializing into view in the dim light of a little ring's glow. "I grabbed everyone easily retrievable. Do any of you need anything before I head up topside and poke about and maybe see about getting a Sending?"

The first man he rescued has apparently been staring at the Commander's Ring for some time, engrossed.

"Where'd you get that ring?" Anevia proposes. "Because the wizard over there says it looks almost mass-made, but I've never heard of an organization with anything like them. ...you don't actually have to answer but I'm deathly curious."

This is the first thing to give him real pause. Including the lady who tried to commit murder. Hm.

"... looted from a sorceress's stash," he answers, after a brief moment of thought. The pause was not to think of a lie or anything, but because he didn't immediately remember the answer. He got it years ago, at this point, from a long-dead and very unpleasant woman known as J'Nah. "Home plane of Toril, the people that make them probably didn't share their notes over here." He looks at the aforementioned wizard. "If you're any good at item crafting, you can study it a bit to try and make something like it when things are a bit less, er." He waves vaguely. "Like this. Help this plane's artificing progress, or something."

     The wizard looks up. "I am very good at item crafting. I've never seen a technique like this, the - piecing together of discrete enchantments by literal recombination of discrete enchanted pieces - it's not that no one thought of it, it just requires such precision! You could make items with no thematic coherence, just whatever magical effects you needed in the field - it's beautiful! And so mundane!"

Anevia coughs loudly. "Anyway, yes, if you're done with the rescues we'll have him get Seelah to Fly us up. We've been looking around with his Clairvoyance, and it seems like there's been a lull in the fighting and Hulrun's staked some territory-"

A sour-faced nobleman interrupts. "Horgus Gwem would pose a question for the noble hero."

(If one listened very closely, they might hear several of Anevia's joints crackle with the effort of not doing anything rash.)

Veron gets the impression that this man is attempting to impressively announce who he is, instead of having the sort of verbal tic where he speaks in the third person. He really would have preferred if he just wanted to speak in the third person.

"I guess I count as one of those sometimes, sure. Yeah?"

"... Half-elf, dark hair, pale skin, snake pendant thing?"

Horgus Gwerm looks... tired. Like he already knows what answer his response will bring.

"Yes. Camellia."

"Well. My condolences, then. Her body's that way, if you'd like to recover it." He doesn't say it, but one can still nonetheless hear him recommend she not get raised.

Then he looks back to the man who he killed her to save, and asks, all detached professionalism, "Could I have my ring back, please? I'll go investigating topside."

Horgus Gwerm closes his eyes. "...no one will blame me, if I do not," he whispers.

     The wizard does not want to stop playing with the ring.

The rogue and spymaster takes it deftly out of his hand, the motion smooth and immediate, and flips it Veronwards like a coin. "Desna smile on you."

Veron catches it and returns it to the finger it came from just as smoothly. He suspects Anevia's aware that he could also have just taken it back as easily as she did, but he's glad she spared him the social capital of being the one to take the poor wizard's shiny toy away from him. He'll get to see it again later, probably, whenever Veron finds something better, or gets his old stuff back.

He obviously does not recognize the invoked goddess, but well wishes are appreciated nonetheless.

"Thanks. You too. Try to stay safe."

And then he turns, inspects the crevasse above them critically, then disappears midway through climbing it as easily as some men climb out of bed.

All right. How on fire is everything up here? Moderately, yeah?

For values of moderately.

Everywhere he looks, there is either a demon, or a small group of crusaders standing guard, or a small group of crusaders murdering or being murdered by demons.

Except for a two-hundred-square-meter radius which contains a large group of crusaders clashing with a small group of very unpleasant-looking demons, Prelate Hulrun at the helm. "STAND AND FIGHT," he bellows as he impales a vrock on his blade, "OR I SWEAR TO EVERY GOD ABOVE NORGORBER YOU'LL WISH THE DEMONS KILLED YOU!"

Yeah, about what he thought.

"Well, you heard the man," says Veron blandly, assisting one of those small groups of crusaders that was on the wrong end of the murdering and then ushering them to join their obvious commander.

He will not be joining the tidy group of crusaders that are all neatly making a defensive wall, and it's rather hard to keep track of him, but, well. His presence is nonetheless felt. Look at all of these demons that are open to being flanked!! Truly, Tymora favors him. Or thinks he's great fun to kick around like the prized ball in a match. Or both. Could go either way, really.

Hulrun realizes pretty soon that someone's playing silly buggers, but it's not until the tide has been turning for a few minutes that he actually catches a glimpse of Veron.

It's not until several minutes after that that he notices that Veron has a very peculiarly shaped bag.

By this point, the battle has actually cooled enough that he can hand off the babau he's been hacking at off to a subordinate before stalking over to Veron's general location.

"Is that. Her head," he asks, breathing heavily.

He winces, even as he sends Camellia's dagger into a vrock's eye socket.

"Yes. I would like to submit it to your authority for raising. ... I'll need either a Sending or a Plane Shift to get the rest of her."

Hulrun has so many questions.

Hulrun is so practiced at not asking those questions at times like this. He reaches into a belt pouch and shoves a wand at Veron. "Sending. Do you also need a Raise Dead scroll."

"Nope, should be good. I owe her a diamond, anyway."

He is perfectly capable of activating a wand. There is, like, one person in all the multiverse that he can dump this nonsense onto and get the immediate reply of "WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG," and fortunately, that person knows Plane Shift. It's about time to call for backup anyway.

With the practiced ease of a man who is accustomed to the 25 word limit of a Sending, he says: "Hey Deeks. Got mugged, now in new plane. Fought some demon locust thing. Need help getting silver dragon corpse from shadow plane. Hope you're well!"

Boss getting quicker. Deekin not finish tea. Ksxksskrth make scones, very disappointed. ETA 12 seconds.

12 seconds later, there is a kobold with bright silver scales, a crossbow strapped to his back, and at least three Bags of Holding on his person. He hugs Veron's leg.

Veron beams at him.

"Hey, buddy," he says warmly, patting Deekin's little scaly head. "Good to have you here. Permission to scoop?"

Normally Deekin would refuse, but actually: paladins make him nervous, and there are a bunch of them, like, everywhere.

"Granted!" Deekin chirps. He stretches out his wings.

Thus, the little winged kobold is scooped up for an enthusiastic hug, spun around once, and then gently set back onto the ground.

"Ksxksskrth get you all set up with a scroll and, uh, stuff already?" He realizes belatedly he didn't explain anything to Ksxksskrth, just kind of. Dumped a beheaded dragon on him. Oops. Sorry.

"Yes. Also scones."

Deekin hands Veron a scone and turns to Hulrun.

"Excuse Deekin. Big holy man have place he want dragon coming back?"

Hulrun does not have time to spend gawping at this ridiculous man and his kobold jester, so he has been killing demons, and only incidentally listening in on their conversation.

That said, he immediately turns his head and says "Behind the shieldwall. We'll protect you while you cast."

"Kay!"

Deekin upends one of the Bags of Holding. Terendelev's body slides out of it, in exactly the condition in which it was appropriated. Deekin then grabs Veron's head-bag, removes the head, and lines it up with the body as appropriate.

Then he takes out the scroll and starts singing the magic out of it.

It's going to take a while.

Veron finishes his scone, pats Deekin on the head affectionately, then swaps his enchanted bag (not a Bag of Holding, for some reason Ksxksskrth gives those to Deekin instead of Veron, which is very unfair) for the now empty Bag of Holding. What kind of adventurer is he if he can't even stash everything not nailed down into a very large bag? A terrible one, that's what.

This reassured, he heads off to go assist in demon killing. Whee! Melee people to flank with!

Ten minutes later, a silver dragon's neck finishes knitting itself back together, and the once-corpse takes a large, shuddering breath.

"... Oh, that was a bullshit lucky hit," are the first words she hisses with that breath. "I had a Word of Recall ready to go once I'd drawn him out of the city and he just--!!! Ugh."

Deekin takes his first breath in ten minutes, and a sip of chilled water.

"Deekin relate. Scythes be like that."

"How can such a stupidly shaped weapon be so good at just the right angle! It's absurd, how doesn't he accidentally cut off his own... Ahem." She shifts to something a bit less taking up the square.

"Thank you very much for your service in raising me, sir, uh." She pauses, and has absolutely no idea how to continue. She... has been raised by a kobold??? With wings?? This. This is a very confusing day, okay.

"Deekin," Deekin says helpfully. "Scalesinger. ...surname self-assigned, hence pun."

"Well, it is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Sir Deekin Scalesinger," says the silver dragon, who bows deeply to the little kobold. "What all's been happe... why is there a giant rift in my city."

Deekin bows back, and does not at all do a little happy dance about the actual real silver dragon liking him.

"Deekin not sure -"

"I made him mad," announces Veron. "Sorry. He did call that thing of his 'Riftcarver,' so..."

Was Veron already here? It's hard to tell. He just does this.

She will not turn into her true form and attempt to squish him. That would not help anything, and might not even work, and for good measure is probably 'evil' or something. She will not do it.

".... Right. Of course," she says primly, attempting to regain something vaguely resembling composure. "And he's gone?"

"You know better than I how difficult it would be for him to incarnate again so soon," Hulrun calls over his shoulder. "But his army is still here, and he threw the bloody Wardstone like a sling bullet. We're far from being out of the woods."

"Yes," agrees Terendelev, nodding firmly. "Very well then."

She bows to Deekin (and also Veron, she guesses) again, and then steps back to return to her true form to maybe make a better entrance this time.

With a volume that would make any dragon proud, she takes to the sky and attempts to rally the city.

"TO ARMS, CRUSADERS. KENABRES WILL NEVER FALL TO THE DEMONS WHILE WE STILL BREATHE!"

Also, she is totally going to work out her frustration by turning so many demons into popsicles.

Deekin hums. "Impressive."

Then he turns into a slightly smaller silver dragon, and joins her in this project.

Veron beams, delighted. Deekin's so happy when he gets to be dragon shaped!!

Anyway yes, ahem, business.

He turns to Hulrun, definitely a serious professional adventurer or something, yes.

"Right, you mentioned a Wardstone. That sounds, uh, important. Which way was it thrown? I'll go check on it."

Hulrun points in a direction. "It seems to have hit the Grey Garrison. Based on the fact that the Grey Garrison is broken."

Then he turns back to the demons, which he finds himself enjoying substantially more than the rest of his day.

"Okay. Thanks." .... This guy seems to be having one Hells of a day. Veron sympathizes, and attempts to use words of encouragement. "Keep up the good work!"

Anyway, Veron has a quest! Onwards, to, er, that kind of broken and definitely grey building that in context is probably the Gray Garrison! He will be quick and stealthy and quiet, and while he is absolutely going to get distracted saving people on the way there, it will barely slow him down at all. Mostly demons that are menacing people can just mysteriously die with him barely slowing down or revealing himself at all! ... Admittedly this might freak out some of the civilians he's saving from death, but, well. He's not perfect, okay, he just does his best.

(Hulrun's combat abilities do improve once he is no longer making a Will save each round to not cast Order's Wrath on that man's location. So, in a sense, he is indeed keeping up the good work.)

One of the civilians he's saving from death, instead of being confused, looks straight at him as he undetectably kills the schirs that had her very thoroughly surrounded.

"What is that illusion?" she asks as his blades do their work, as if asking where someone at a party got a very fine hat. "I've never seen anything quite like it."

... why is that her question in this situation????

Oh. Oh, this is a wizard-or-something. And unfortunately for him, probably one of the good ones. The 'unfortunately' is not because he thinks she's going to turn hostile or anything, but because he's about to be studied like some kind of fascinating insect. Right then, let's get this over with. (He finishes killing the schirs.)

"Arguably it's not quite an illusion." He has had this explained to him before, ask how he knows. (He has partied with at least one wizard in his life. That's how he knows.) "I'm calling a bit of the Plane of Shadow to be closer in this part of the material than usual, and briefly borrowing," the technical word is conjuring, but he feels borrowing gets across his impression of how it feels better, "a bit of ash from there to extinguish any lights in the area, among other things." It also tends to cause fatigue to most things, demons included.

(Read: He has used the shadowdancer ability Shadow Call to mimic the spell known as Dust of Twilight. The place he was saving her in was a bit too literally on fire and therefore well-lit for his taste, at least when he doesn't have paladins to hide behind. He gets DR 10 in areas of dim light, this is important to keep up when one is doing solo rescue attempts over long periods of time, regenerative ring or no.)

"Ah!" she says happily. "Like -"

She extends her hand, and conjures some balls of ash with oversized eyes. They scurry over her arm before falling off; this pulls her sleeve up, leaves soot all over her arm, and reveals a deep and blood-crusted gash which was clearly not received in the past few minutes.

She frowns. "That wasn't what I wanted at all. You don't have a scroll of it, presumably..."

Oh no. She's definitely one of the good ones. And he's about to go poking around something magically complicated, that being a Wardstone. Probably he should recruit the wizard now, so he doesn't have to circle back around to grab her later if it turns out he needs someone that can do more than just pretend to know what magic is going on very competently. Also this is definitely the type of wizard that needs to managed.

"I don't, sorry. It's a," oh, how did Nathyrra put it...? His voice takes on a somewhat dead sounding tone as he rattles off what answer she came to, after making him do this very shadow thingy in different ways for days. "'localized effect tied to my own status as debatably-an-outsider.'" Less debatably lately, with his whole complicated relationship with Hell, but still. "It does not go onto scrolls as it is. ... Do you need a healing potion."

She doesn't even glance at the wound. "The marginal utility of a healing potion is likely higher for me than for you," she acknowledges. "I'm not about to fall over. I've been struck five times, one quite badly; holistically speaking I could probably be wounded three more times by the average schir, unless of course it got me in the neck, but it's not as if a potion would help with that unless it was a potion of Stoneskin."

Why is his life like this.

He could give her the potion and leave. It'd be easier. Maybe he can sort it out himself! Maybe the great big magic thing is fine after being thrown across the city, and all he needs to do is kiss it better or something, yeah no that sounds stupid even to his desperate attempts at self deception. Sigh. Fine. Fine. She is not the worst wizard he's ever met. He will take what small comfort in this that he can.

"Let's go with 'yes,'" he passes the potion towards her, "and then I'll ask if you would like to come with me as I do more weird outsidery shadow magic on my way to the Wardstone. It just got thrown and is probably, uh, also weird or something right now."

Her gaze sharpens immediately. She forgets about the potion entirely. "The Wardstone! Yes, please. Do you have a Portable Hole, or shall I accompany you in person? I expect the demonic resistance to outclass my offensive capabilities, but I would certainly not object to watching you do more weird outsidery shadow magic."

"Portable Hole got stolen, sorry." Also, he would not want to put her there because he thinks he still hadn't cleared out all of the creepy Netherese books. Creepy Netherese books should not be exposed to wizards of this kind, ever, not even in complete darkness and surrounded by all of his miscellaneous adventuring junk that would probably also distract her. He has at least a basic understanding of how to not cause a new lich to rise and begin doing lichy things.

"Drink the potion, then, uh. Head directly towards the Gray Garrison," it is fortunately visible, and he points, "at your top speed. I will likely be doing all of my weird outsidery shadow magic around you, when things inevitably attempt to ambush you. ... I will also be doing the magic when we get there, making a detour will not ultimately get you more time to look at outsidery shadow magic."

Can you tell that he's partied with a wizard before? It's very subtle, his flinch response and knowledge of the obvious wizard pitfalls.

She remembers the potion, takes it, and drinks it.

Then she clicks her heels together in the somatic component for Expeditious Retreat and starts sprinting towards the Garrison at slightly over 27 miles per hour.

... Oh no. He has made an error. This is one of those obvious pitfalls of wizards; he did not specify well enough. Now he must live with the consequences. This is maybe a bit too fast for the comfort of his escort quest, but you know what, it's fine. It would go wrong in other ways if he tried to slow her down, he's certain. Besides, he likes a challenge, and her going this fast means less things will ambush her.

He ends up needing to Haste himself (with a scroll that was stuffed into the Bag of Holding in advance, because Haste is the most mandatory rogue buff in all of existence) (he misses his boots so much), but he does succeed at keeping Nenio from getting savaged by too many things. She gets to witness a decent amount of weird outsidery shadow magic, too! Look, he can teleport between bits of shadow, and make things that could more arguably be called illusions, and the shadow magic conjuration he did earlier is very flexible!

Also, by the time they get there he is panting and out of breath. Can he go back to stabbing the locust guy? He liked that better.

When she arrives, her face is almost purple, her legs are trembling, and her breathing is painful to hear - let alone to imagine what it might feel like. That said, she's standing, and her expression is vaguely amused as ever.

"I will - be better - able - to function - with - a potion - of - Lesser Restoration," she wheezes.

It is some consolation that she is also tired. Not much of one, but some.

“Don’t… keep any of those… handy, in the back up equipment, sorry,” he replies, winded. He is regretting this lack of foresight now. “We can… take a breather, I… wanted to scout a bit before properly heading in, anyway.”

He’s fine, he’s fine, just give him five minutes and he’ll be good as new. He’s not even fatigued, just. That was a lot of running, and stealth kills, and shadow tricks, and. Yeah he’s earned a breather.

Nenio nods. She alters her stance, putting her hands on her thighs and sucking in deeper breaths. Once she can breathe better, she takes out a bag of salt and measures a decent spoonful into her mouth, then takes out a waterskin and drinks it in five careful gulps, separated by half a minute each.

She looks around. "It's a pity that the fountain over there has been defiled," she says ruefully. "Ray of Frost can produce a very good ice bath, which alleviates the injurious effects of overexertion on the body. But I should be able to pronounce verbal components again, and follow you to the Wardstone as long as you do not need me to move very quickly."

Veron... does not have a waterskin or canteen. Hm. Add that to the list of stuff he should acquire, at some point in the future. In his defense, the city got invaded before he had time to do his shopping, okay. For now he'll make due by leaning on a nearby wall, watching with some amusement as the wizard efficiently combats dehydration. He's glad she has some self preservation habits built in, somewhere in there.

"Mhm," he agrees, after her announcement. He takes a deep breath, unleans from the wall, and stretches, already mostly recovered. "But I'm going to scout ahead and whatnot, if any demon's got any sense it'll be guarded. Do you have an illusion to disguise yourself with while I'm gone?"

She thinks about this.

"I can use Disguise Self to make myself appear as a babau," she says, "and then Silent Image a pile of rubble to hide in. Then, if a demon sees me, they will need to pierce two illusions rather than one; and if a crusader sees me, I can dismiss the illusion and have them protect me."

“Sure, sounds good. Message or fling an obvious cantrip upwards if something goes wrong? Or just yell, I guess.”

"I can do any or all of those things," she agrees. "Out of curiosity, do you have a scroll of Invisibility? It would be convenient to be invisible rather than disguised, and I would also like to know the spell."

"Nnnnnot at the moment, but I can probably get one without too much trouble. I'll keep an eye out."

And with that, he does one of his shadow tricks that kind of is magic but definitely isn't a spell, in that he steps into the nearby darkness and seems to disappear. (It's just Hide in Plain Sight.)

Okay! What's the inside of this place look like? He imagines that the Wardstone will be straightforward to find, if not necessarily easy to get to. What with the whole, uh. Being used to slightly ruin the garrison.

Yep! From the central atrium he can see that it's pierced through the vaulted ceiling three stories above at a jaunty angle; in order to access it conveniently, he would need to either ascend through several demon-infested floors of the building, or do some acrobatic bullshit.

Definitely going to go with acrobatic bullshit, thank you, he doesn't super want to try and piece together a route through a half collapsed garrison. He'll see about clearing a proper path through it for the wizard, of course, but first he would like to find the person that seems most likely to be in charge of the demon forces present. And then he will stab them before they realize there's anything to be scared about. Boss fights go much easier that way, in his experience*!

(*Please note, results may vary with this tactic if one is not an epic level, teleporting rogue with a truly absurd number of points in stealth.)

There's this lady! She mostly looks like a very classical Sexy Lady Demon - lots of gold, elegant swooping horns, long swishy tail - with her distinguishing feature being a total lack of eyes. Her face is otherwise perfectly formed, of course. She's ordering other demons around, fortifying the place, and laying various magical wards.

Ahuh.

And unfortunately, she is in the center of a very large, well lit (by the glowing Wardstone he's here for) room. Surrounded by mostly empty space and demons scurrying about to do her bidding. Sneaking around the edges of that is straightforward (for him). Sneaking into melee range for a proper sneak attack, in these conditions? Ehhhn. That'll take a bit more finesse. That's not to say that he can't, just, he will need literal magic and his escape options after he's done will be slim. It's riskier than he'd like.

Probably he should go fetch Deekin and the wizard and maybe Terendelev and that one cranky leader guy and handle this properly as a party. But by the time that's been organized, this place will be actually fortified. Systematically fighting their way through an entrenched force will take ages. And he's pretty sure this Wardstone does, like, protection stuff? For the rest of the city? Which is currently very much on fire. So. He'd kind of like this done sooner rather than later, for the sake of less people dying.

.... He'll compromise, and slink off to a little corner to quietly buff first. Haste, at the very least. And then he'll go and stab her, with the help of just a little hint of a shadowy illusion, to make the air look like it does not contain him while he slips through a perfectly well lit, open space with at least a dozen witnesses.

She doesn't look up from her work etching a glowing rune as he approaches. Why would she? He's completely undetectable, and she doesn't even have eyes.

..... okay, yes, but....

He stops before he reaches her, because this feels...

It feels like someone else is tapping into the Plane of Shadow, and it isn't him.

"Ah, Hells," he sighs, out loud, perfectly audible.

"Aww!" the demon says, smiling at her rune and still not looking in his direction. "You completely spoiled it, you know, you were supposed to try to stab the illusion and fall straight through, and then I'd say let's talk, darling... anyway. Let's talk, darling."

(The other demons are startled and frantically grabbing for their weapons, until she speaks up. Then there's a general air of oh, more of her bullshit.)

"Will you pack up your minions and head out if I ask nicely?" wonders Veron, already rapidly retreating to a darker and more defensible corner, even as he speaks casually.

"How nicely can you ask?" she purrs, getting to her feet with a deeply unnecessary amount of slink.

Then she breaks character, laughs and says "I had to, I had to! It's such a cliché... but, seriously. I could tell these clowns to clear out, but I don't control the invasion force at large. I'm, ah, middle management."

Why do evil people always flirt with him!!!! Why is this a problem he has!!! Deekin doesn't have this problem! Admittedly that might be because many people aren't into kobolds, but still, there are other non-kobold examples of people not having this problem!! Probably! He's pretty sure Valen didn't, and he's, like, the most absurdly pretty tiefling that ever existed! Not that he asked if he had this problem, because that would be weird!!! Why does this keep happening to him!!!!!!!!!

"Ahuh. Well. Then I apologize for how this will look to your boss, but I'd really appreciate it if you and they could all shoo. The invasion's a losing battle at this point, you can call it cutting your losses."

"Alright. You lot!" She snaps her fingers at the roomful of demons. "Clear out. Go rendezvous back with Khorramzadeh, or join Darrazand, or, fuck it, go back to Alushinyrra and enjoy the Ten Thousand Delights, tell Chivarro you worked for me, she'll give you a coupon."

The demons look at each other. One of them, a babau, says "Khorramzadeh's orders were to..."

She sighs heavily and snaps her fingers again. The babau in question shreds into greasy black ash. "I have alternative offers. Fuck off while the fucking's good."

The remaining demons make themselves scarce.

Except for her, obviously. The illusion dissolves, and an identical copy steps out from behind the Wardstone, stretching her arms above her head. "Gods, minions are annoying. You forces of Good are so lucky you don't have to deal with having people on your side who you hate."

".... No, we do. I think that's just a universal problem with working with other people."

This usually doesn't work, and he therefore doesn't trust it at all. He smells a trap.

"Oh. Huh. A paladin tried to tell me something, once, about how the real strength of Good was... something... I thought she said the forces of Good all loved each other, but I'll admit I was only sort of paying attention. She had a sword, that part seemed more relevant."

The demoness crouches down and starts dismantling the runes around the Wardstone. "So. Can you guess why I'm not going to fight you to protect this dumb rock? There's a prize if you get my questions right!"

"I'd say it's more about how we all can usually trust each other, and our ways of advancing ourselves don't require us to tear each other down. We can just, you know, help each other, and no one has to lose at all."

He considers this demonic middle manager, her intelligence score, and her priorities.

"... I'd guess that it's because you have accurately surmised that I have already successfully stabbed your boss, and want absolutely no part of that nonsense? Especially after I saw through your illusion without touching it?"

She finishes fiddling with a particularly intricate rune and then applauds. "Yes! That is one of my reasons! It was a trick question, sorry, I'm evil. I did see, and hear, when you stabbed my boss's boss's boss. Wanna guess another reason?"

He raises his eyebrows.

"You're getting much more out of me by talking to me than by losing in a fight to me, and will likely be rewarded accordingly for this information? And you've probably guessed that if you do just leave I will actually let you, in an admittedly probably vain hope that one day you will actually realize that being evil sucks and you'd like to stop?"

She taps a fingernail against her lips. "Honestly I'm not sure if that's a point. Obviously I get more out of talking to you than being impaled - non-euphemistically - but if I tell anyone that this conversation happened the way it did they'll probably have me tortured? Non-euphemistically. Mm. Half-point. So, the thing I gain by this conversation in addition to not being stabbed is a way to give you information on a bunch of legitimate strategic targets you might want to non-euphemistically impale, who also just so happen to be people I want dead! Whether because they're above me in the chain of command or because they personally pissed me off. Advancing myself by tearing others down, that thing you said. It'll even weaken the forces of the Abyss on net! Which I don't care about, but you do!"

She hums to herself, scraping powdered silver off of the stone into a glass vial. "I've got one more reason that I'm going to admit to before I leave you a big pile of plausibly deniable intel. And this one's for the money; this one counts. Why, lightbringer, am I not fighting you for the Wardstone that has stood for almost a century, defending Kenabres and the world from the legions of the Pit?"

".... because by this point, after almost a century, it's probably beginning to wear down, and you don't think that's something I can fix. And it would probably be fun to watch me fail, or something?"

"Ding, ding, ding." Minagho straightens back up, and turns her head to grin straight at him, laying her hand demonstratively on the Wardstone's glowing surface. "It's broken. If you could fix it, you wouldn't want it at the cost. Defending it from you would be a waste of my valuable time... and if I want to waste my time, I have better ways to do it."

She licks her lips. "As to that prize - care for a Wish? I get one a week, usable only at a mortal's behest, and I never get to spend them on anything interesting. I don't know what you'd want, but I know it'd be interesting."

So, on one hand: it's a trap.

On the other hand: it's a Wish.

".... All right, I'll bite. I wish to use it to dissolve the contracts of people who have sold their souls to devils, regret this decision, and who would go into an afterlife they consider better without a dumb piece of metaphysical paper saying they belong to someone else. Nice and easy for a demon to get behind, yeah?"

She gasps with delight. "Oh, I love it! Now, I'm not going to be able to cover all of the contracts, or even that many objectively speaking, because trying to fit that into a Wish would result in the destruction of a significant portion of this planet, and I'm keeping some things there. But I can set up... hmmm... a loop, we might call it? That will go through contract history, inconspicuously gathering data on the circumstances thereof, and then, after it's gone through a few hundred million and sorted them by worthiness according to your lights, start dissolving as many of them as it can, starting at the top. Do you like it? Please say you like it!"

All right. Sometimes when you disarm a trap, it's not neatly. It's by carefully and systematically setting it off. It's often about weighing the risks, and...

... Well. It'd help a lot of people.

"I do, yes. Thank you for not blowing up the planet, I appreciate that. Pleasure doing business with you, hope I never do again."

This is going to suck, isn't it.

She lowers her head and starts chanting.

It's... not like any other spell that he's seen. The chant isn't even words. It's just... tones. She's not singing, she's just emitting tones, one after another, so fast the individual sounds aren't audible, just the cascading noise of it going up and down and across itself, jangling like a sore tooth in his ears. Her lips are open, not moving; he can see her tongue, and that's still too. She's just making that noise.

It takes her almost a full minute. Over the course of that minute, things start happening. First her skin goes dry, then patches of it crack and flake like old paint. One of her horns starts smoking. Her nose bleeds, her ears, her gums, her fingernails. The place where her eyes should be bulges with something that isn't flesh. The horn that isn't smoking suddenly explodes, shards of keratin flying everywhere. Her tail lashes along her own legs, leaving them criss-crossed with lines of blood. Still, the chant goes on -

and then she stops. She collapses to the ground, laughing giddily. The wounds remain, but they stop worsening.

It's done.

Yeah, he can fucking tell.

It's - it's like his cleverly worded wish is being twisted against him. It's like he willingly opened the door to something awful, and now it can put its feet up on the table and make itself at home. It's like raw malevolent chaos itself is reaching into his mind for his sincerely offered desire, and using it as leverage to make him just like it. It doesn't matter if it succeeds or not, not really. It will suck if it fails and it'll suck if it works, and he was stupid either way. This risk, this sacrifice, to maybe save people he doesn't know, will probably never meet, and who almost certainly do not deserve it, was not worth it. None of it is worth it. Nothing will ever be good, ever again, so he might as well just burn it all down to watch the way the ashes fall. Better yet, tear it down to fall in ways that'll amuse him. C'mon, he enjoyed the game of hide and seek with the Archon, wouldn't he like to do something like that whenever he wants? He could just find people and play with them.

He flinches like a man burned and belatedly remembers that, oh right, he is kind of weaker than normal to mind-affecting things, isn't he. This was, in retrospect, the obvious way this trap would go off.

It almost, almost looks like it works, almost clicks perfectly into place, that right now he is weak enough and badly geared enough and arrogant enough to get him into this situation and...

just...

fall.

And tear it all down because he's powerful and he can.

But that 'almost' is pretty important, and Veron took the Slippery Mind feat. This new way his mind is meant to function does not... make sense, and so...

He gets to try again.

"Nggh," he says, eloquently, as he flinches again and refuses.

"You know," he says, rubbing the bridge of his nose and nursing a brand new massive headache, "I think I would have preferred if you'd just tried to kill me, to be perfectly honest."

Minagho's still cackling, give her a minute.

"This is going to be so fun!!!!!!!!!"

Then she's gone. Only the blood, and the ruins of her horn, remain.

No, wait, that's a very thick book with a gold-embossed title plate of PEOPLE MINAGHO HATES VOL. 1: NOT DEAD YET thumping to the floor.

Yeah. Yeah, that's. About what he expected, really.

Ow.

... Worth it?

...... yeah. Kinda. Because it worked. But that's the only reason why, because otherwise, it was phenomenally, cosmically stupid. It might possibly be the dumbest thing he's ever done, and this is from a man that has been adventuring for a decade and done very many stupid things.

He needs to not do anything like that ever again, even if it's very very tempting, and he's very very clever and very very powerful. Deekin is going to tear him a new asshole. And Ksxksskrth! He's going to be strangled in his sleep by the people that love him the most, and he will deserve it.

But it is very nice that he saved so many people. Maybe. Probably. Just the chance. It's very possible they might still go to an evil afterlife, and then, well. He didn't really help them at all, did he. Ugh.

He picks up the book, and he checks that the garrison is in fact free of demons now. And then he can go get the wizard and see if she can come look at what's wrong with the Wardstone, because he does not want to try and do it on his own right now. That is what stupid people do. Stupid people who very nearly almost become superpowerful demon-alikes, what the fuck, Veron!!!

The wizard has made herself very red, very tall, and very emaciated, put on a concealing black cloak, and is currently hanging out inside an illusory pile of masonry.

"Hello!" she says. "I just witnessed the most powerful magical aura I have ever seen. Was that you?"

"I probably at least helped. Wardstone's free to look at, if you still want to."

Meanwhile, he would like to crawl in a hole with the biggest keg of cheap booze the world has ever seen, drink until his stupid, empty head can't even pretend to think straight, and then sleep it off until the world goes and fixes itself while he's not looking. That's reasonable, right? Totally doable? No? Damnation.

"I do!"

She hups to her feet and enters the Garrison. She does not dismiss Disguise Self, though she does stop concentrating on Silent Image.

Ehhnn, whatever, she's a grown woman and can...

Ngh. Fine. He's a 'good person' who 'cares about others' or whatever, and if this is a flinch response to almost getting twisted into evil, good.

"It'll be a good idea to dismiss the disguise, too, so no one gets confused. I expect the crusadery types to show up, uh, eventually."

"Ah! Thank you. I forget, sometimes, that other people cannot see the truth of illusions."

She melts back into her natural human form.

"You're welcome."

Okay, time to be silent with his own self hatred, please and thank you. The wizard is now fine, she will happily wizard at the thing and tell him how he's fucked and the eyeless demon lady was totally right all along.

Stairs, stairs, stairs. The wizard has almost entirely recovered from her track and field adventure earlier, and thus does not need Veron to physically carry her at any point. Though she does wobble sort of alarmingly a few times.

Then: the Wardstone chamber. She looks around, fascinated.

"This room contains many magical auras. It actually makes it slightly difficult to see!"

He'll make a note to do his next incredibly dumb evil ritual that risks his soul somewhere away from the gigantic fucking Wardstone, how about?

Eugh. He really wants to be able to not think thoughts. It sucks so much.

"Well. Sorry about that. I don't think I can move the Wardstone out of here to somewhere cleaner. Can you work through it?"

"Oh, yes. I can still focus on individual auras! It's mostly just the walls and floor that I have trouble with. Please prevent me from falling over."

She walks over to the Wardstone without major incident, sits cross-legged, and engages in a staring contest with it.

This makes preventing her from falling over pretty straightforward.

He waits. And kind of hates himself. And his choices. And wonders when Deekin will inevitably show up. (Damn it, he's going to know immediately, isn't he, now Veron wants to go somewhere he can never ever be found, forevermore.)

Nenio looks up. "This Wardstone is broken," she says.

This almost causes him to laugh out loud, at the absurdity of the statement. Yes. Yes, he knows.

"..... Yes," he agrees, blandly. "Do... you know how?"

"Its function is the product of a collaborative effort between a number of similar but distinct magical fields within the artifact itself. If they were perfectly aligned, the Wardstone would work perfectly, radiating a field which demons cannot penetrate and linking to the network of other Wardstones to project one large field of only slightly reduced power. The fields have come out of alignment, with almost none of them aligned perfectly, and nearly 30% of them in active conflict with the rest. The misalignment is itself corrosive to the function and alignment of the remaining fields, and if a sufficient number of them 'flipped', as it were, then the Wardstone might, depending on various thaumaturgical factors, begin attracting demons, strengthening demons, repelling Good- or Lawful-aligned actors, weakening or harming those actors, creating a violent primal magic field, or exploding with sufficient force to create a new Lake Encarthan. Would you like me to continue looking?"

Oh, gods, now he has to try to understand the wizard.

He takes a minute to try and wrap his head around the words being used.

".... that's an odd way for it to fail," he observes instead of engaging with most of that, frowning. "The - coming into active conflict with itself, instead of just. Running out of power or something."

"It is!" she says happily. "I wonder if it's based on the alignment-linked magic used to create the Stone itself? Aligned mortals change their alignments, but outsiders as a rule don't, and I would naively expect a magical effect to be more similar to the latter. Hmm... can an intelligent magic item change its alignment? What if it has an aligned enchantment?"

"Outsiders can change their alignment," he corrects, immediately, "it's just much harder for them, like - instead of being in a still pond and able to freely choose where they go, they have to actively swim upstream. Or maybe more closely like momentum, it's much easier to just keep going the same way they've always done it, unless something... changes." He frowns. "Or they get worn down over time."

"... Intelligent magical items usually get made from souls, not... the item itself gaining intelligence on its own over time. It's ever happened, but usually it's someone getting stuffed into something," he says out loud. 'If you could fix it, you wouldn't want it at the cost,' Minagho had said.

It doesn't really make sense, that they'd come up with such a complete magical defense against demons so quickly, does it. This sort of thing is difficult, and they'd probably been under some kind of rush, what with the demonic invasion and all. The obvious way to repel a demon invasion is to weigh in the opposite direction, with angels and archons and whatnot. Angelic invasion. But that would turn this into an even worse battleground, and more innocent mortals would die in the horrors on the battlefield, so...

... what if there was a way to have those forces just hold the demons back, while they looked for a better solution. One that involves less large scale destruction and death.

He has a sinking suspicion about why Minagho would think he wouldn't be willing to pay the cost to fix it.

"... If it were stuffed full of like minded, Good-aligned outsiders, would that explain what you're seeing?"

She squints a bit more.

"Well, they're not like-minded anymore. But yes!"

"Right. Because they've been in there for a very long time, and. This shit still isn't solved. Anybody'd start to have second thoughts after a century. Even outsiders."

Okay, great. He understands what's wrong with the Wardstone. And he also understands that it's a horror, and once-willingly trapped, selfless people now just. Want to stop. Be free of this suffering, being stuck in a rock and forgotten about because you were thoughtful enough to want to keep the body count down.

If they stop, then lots of people will die.

If they don't, they will continue to suffer. And it might not even ultimately change things, with how this mess has been a stalemate for so long. Their suffering could be made entirely meaningless, because then the thing they'd sacrificed so much to stop could just. Happen anyway.

In summary: everything sucks and he hates it, actually.

"... Right, okay. Well. Then I'm going to try to talk to them," he sighs, because apparently he hasn't done enough stupid things today.

She swivels around to an angle that will allow her to stare at the Wardstone and Veron simultaneously.

Then she gives him a thumbs-up.

Wizards.

He huffs a laugh despite himself, though, because. Yeah. Fair enough. Wizards do be like that.

Then he steps towards the Wardstone, reaches out, and. Touches it.

(This is gonna suck.)

It's not the kind of battle that he's used to. There's no clashing of arms, no battlecries.

It's not even one of the kinds of battle that he never got used to - the Underdark wars of shadows meeting in the night, the fiendish wars of two forces devouring each other whole.

It is a battle of angels, and it is thus:

There are angels on one side.

There are angels on the other side.

They are shouting, some of them. They are pleading, some of them. They are crying, or holding each other tight, or engaging in tired philosophical debates that have been going on for half a century.

Some of them are not really angels anymore; they have been so terribly hurt that something has changed within them, and they have lost sight of Good and turned to pure Law, or Chaos, or sometimes Evil.

There is no way to tell the difference between the sides.

Following the fallen angels reveals that some, by their turning to Law, have only been strengthened in their conviction that order must be kept; others have realized that there is no justice in this perversion of the laws of reality. Chaos says that the demons should roam free, Chaos says that the people of this world must be free to live. Even Evil is not an overwhelming factor. Some of the fiends want the Wardstones destroyed, but just as many have sunken into feverish, solipsistic hatred for the armies of the Pit, and would do anything to hurt them.

And at irregular intervals, a jarring rush of pain flows through their cage, pausing the shouting and pleading and debate while it lasts. Usually, a throbbing ache. Sometimes, a deep branding burn. At its worst, a flaying storm of razor wind lasting minutes, or hours, or days.

This is not Hell. Hell, he knows, and found wanting.

Is this worse than Hell?

It’s debatable, really. Hell had suffering, and despair, and monsters destroying each other, and the endless cold, and souls crushed underfoot for no other reason than to let devils be tyrants of something. It was awful, and cruel, and unfair, and had this horrible mockery of law, like if you had the right sort of contract drawn up, that made it okay to suffer. Like that made it inevitable to suffer forever. It was suffocating, all encompassing, like being trapped in the smallest cage in the deepest prison with no hope to ever see daylight again.

But this hurts his heart more. This… is seeing something that had once been beautiful, people that had once been whole and strong and brave and Good and… seeing what’s left of them after so long neglected. Like a wretched undead golem stitched out of the corpses of heroes, while they all scream inside, each and every one. That’s what this is like. To call it a horror would be to call Cania a bit chilly, words don’t do it justice. These poor, brave souls. Tears prick at his eyes and begin silently tracing little trails down his cheeks.

First things first - can he identify the source of the pain? Is it just a part of the Wardstone’s original design, or is it a flaw that was introduced later? He’d be in a better position to address the angels if he had literally anything to offer them.

When the angels were united, the wall was strong. When the wall was strong, it didn't hurt. They could feel when the barrier activated, but it wasn't even really jarring, just an impact, like a leather ball against a shield.

The wall is weak, splintered and crazed with faultlines. Each time a demon so much as tests the barrier, it strikes like a gong against the scattered angels, pushes them away from each other and towards each other, away from themselves and into themselves, warping them like unfired clay dolls. When there's a full assault, the barrier has to draw on their reserves of strength - which would be tiring if they were together, but now it feels like a gutting, wrenching violation.

Ah. Yep. Okay.

So he cannot solve any problems before he starts talking.

Hey, he sends, in a way he doesn’t quite know how to put to words. Deep breaths, everyone. I’m here, and I’m going to help.

It’s rather like when he addressed Mephistopheles, that final time after he’d clawed his way out of Cania. Not as hostile, obviously, but the same sort of working beyond being just a guy that’s really good at sneaking and stabbing things. He is announcing himself, and who he is, and what that means, in that way beyond mortals that it’s impossible to really lie about. Veron Chandler, professional lost person, rogue and shadowdancer of Good. Just Good, because to him, Law and Chaos are just tools to be leveraged for that ultimate purpose. He is a Lord of Shadow and the Light of Cania and, yes, that’s an oxymoron, welcome to his life, it’s been a lot of epic level bullshit lately.

He is not here to fight them, or make them do anything in particular. He is here to help. They all already know the stakes, better than he does. The way they’ve all collectively been pushed is now meeting none of their goals. So: he is going to provide some space to breathe, to redistribute themselves, to reorganize. How’s he doing that? Well, he’ll hold the wall for them. Not forever, he’s not strong enough, but. Just for a little while. Sometimes a break from the pain is all you really need, to have some space to think. Not to decide to do anything in particular, not yet, but just. Breathe.

The angels flurry and warble in shock. There are 786 angels (including those who are no longer angels) in the Wardstone, and when Veron makes himself known he receives twice that many questions.

Then he lifts the weight of the barrier away from them, and all of that stops being relevant, because -

in some ways it's easier for him than it is for them. He won't be hurt by the forces pushing him apart, because he has one singular purpose; there's nothing opposing him within his own heart. (The last dregs of Abyssal influence are squeezed out of him in less than a second. There's no room for that here.)

The problem is that he is holding up the weight meant to be shared between 786 powerful angels, and for all that he might as well be a demigod, he's not a hundred demigods. He wasn't built for this.

He's used up his this is going to suck allotment for this sequence of events. Which is a pity, because this is going to suck.

Ow ow ow ow ow he is the biggest dumbass in all of the multiverse, but also he regrets nothing.

He is definitely not going to be able to hold this forever, but that's not really the point. He just needs to hold it up for long enough for them to, er...

Sort themselves out?

On second thought, that is maybe a bit naive, even for him.

"You realize it's significantly easier for the rest of us if you give us a heads up before you start to do something phenomenally well meaning but indescribably stupid," sighs a shadow, who is nonetheless going to begin helping.

Not by directly taking the weight of the wall, actually, because he has more good sense than good intentions, but in all of the everything else. Ksxksskrth is accustomed to attempting to organize the barely controlled chaos that are known to the world as 'adventurers.' And the much less controlled chaos of a full estate on the Plane of Shadow that keeps picking up very confused strays, for some reason or another, ahem. This is not quite like that, but also, it's very much like that.

Okay, angels, once-angels, and those of you now violently opposed to being called angels! Those of you who would like to LEAVE the WARDSTONE, organize yourselves to the left! Those of you who would like to stay, to the right! Organize yourselves into LIKE MINDED GROUPS, we are on a TIME CRUNCH and you've had long enough stuck with each other, so you should all know yourselves and your fellows by now! Please note that leaving the Wardstone can also mean 'Directly come out of the Wardstone to go kill demons in person,' which is admittedly not ideal but they probably have a LOT of pent up aggression! If you have an EVIL ALIGNMENT and wish to LEAVE THE WARDSTONE, you will not be forced to stay, obviously, but you will be released instead onto the PLANE OF SHADOW to PREVENT IN-FIGHTING.

After a century of confinement, the angels do not remember what it was, for something to have urgency. They are expected to make a decision now? In seconds? This is not a scenario that the debates covered!!! Give them months! Give them a year! Let them learn how they feel!

Those of you who DO NOT HAVE COMPLICATED FEELINGS get to be SORTED OUT FIRST. The rest of you have UNTIL THAT GUY (read: Veron) FALLS OVER to sort yourselves out. If you do not know what urgency is then you'd best LEARN QUICKLY, or help him out to buy more time for everyone else to figure out what you're doing.

He is aware that this probably means everyone is going to flee the Wardstone immediately, and therefore the Wardstone is likely to just collapse. However, Ksxksskrth is not equipped to move the hearts of men or angels, and definitely not things that were once angels. He is, in his (cold, because shadow) heart of hearts a logistician, and so if organizing the angels and enacting their reorganization according to his lord's will means the Wardstone will break, then, well. Darn. Maybe now Veron will wait like five minutes for buffs and backup before he does his next very stupid thing. That sure would be nice.

Fortunately, some people care about such ephemeral things as 'dreams' and 'vibes.'

They have been aware that there was something wrong with the Wardstone for a while. It's just all of those Lawful types didn't like their 'ambiguous evidence' and 'unconventional reasoning.' The enemy they've all been fighting loves ambiguous evidence and unconventional reasoning; they're often the weapons leveraged to cause destruction. It's easy to forget the value of such things when you expect every instance to contain a trap. Therefore, the Wardstone is to be kept safe from such dangerous influences.

While it's very reasonable to want to keep the crux of your city's defenses safe, there is a difference between keeping something safe and keeping it in a cage. Often the line can be too fine to discern until it's too late. Especially when one forgets that the crux of your city's defenses is based around living things, and treats it as instead a great big object to be worked around.

Living things do not much like being treated that way.

The (peaceful!) withdrawal of the demons from the Gray Garrison was very noticeable. Most haven't had the time to respond to such an unexpected turn of events; the city's defenders are generally all busy reorganizing themselves and driving the demons out of less fortified locations. But some people were forewarned of the Wardstone's significance, and they were nearby enough to both notice and now intervene. There are neither demons nor inquisitors to ward anyone off, not anymore.

Ramien, the high priest of Desna in Kenabres, does not quite understand what is going on. But he understands that there are lost and hopeless people in front of him, contained within this great glowing stone. That's enough for him.

He opens his mouth to sing to them. It's not a song of words and notes, exactly, like True Names are not really made of syllables. It is a song of sincere truth, of essence of what the singer wishes to convey, of pure emotion and power. It is the most powerful divine working he has ever done, and Ramien has never in his life been idle.

While he does not know the pain they have been through, or what they will choose to do, he is with them. He will support them however he can. Wherever they go, whatever path they choose to take, he will wish them well on it. If it leads them to the very Abyss itself, he trusts them to find their way, wherever that path leads. They deserve happiness, and peace, and whimsy, and joy, like everyone, everywhere, deserves it. His song is not a call to do anything in particular, not really, except by perhaps example. It is of hope and acceptance and being free to choose, and in his case, choosing to help. The world is wide and beautiful and utterly mad, and all of them are just little pieces of a much larger whole that none of them ever really understands. There will never be perfect certainty. There is never a definitive correct path to take.

There are only people, who want to do their best.

Sometimes, that's enough.

...that simplifies matters considerably. Knowing what one wants is like a muscle that can fall into disuse - but like a muscle, it can be enhanced by sufficient magic.

Angels group themselves to return home, wherever home is, or exit directly to the battlefield. Many choose to stay, aligning themselves behind Veron so they can settle into well-ordered formation once he returns their burden.

Some of the Evil angels take the immediate out; they can regroup on the Plane of Shadow for what comes next. Some hesitate.

thE IslE Of thE pEnItEnt, one croaks hopefully.

heaven??? one tries. they can find use of me broken that i am wretch that i am

I would join you, one of them says thoughtfully, with unusual coherence. The one who came after the hero. You may be... worthy, where others were not.

Isle of the Penitent and Heaven are both acceptable options that they can make happen. The interim is going to still be the Plane of Shadow for logistical reasons, but from there they can work out how to get them to the appropriate location. Outsiders that desire to return home specifically have a mechanism that can more easily get them back; it's when they want somewhere else that it starts to get tricky. But the Plane of Shadow is a crossroads for many other planes of existence, so it makes a good interim location for travel to other places.

Ksxksskrth will accept the outsider's application on the spot for being able to have its shit at all together in this cacophony. That one will also be going to the Plane of Shadow, but gets to help with the organizing of the various others that want to disperse from there. Since there's kind of going to be a lot to organize. This is a very Plane of Shadow based operation, the outsider might have noticed. Welcome to the team, hope you won't miss sunlight, because there is none and will never be any.

That particular ex-angel takes to herding its fellows with a certain amount of satisfaction. It has been a long time since anything mattered; it's a heady feeling, to do something.

Within a scant few minutes, the angels are duly arrayed. The only angels staying behind are the ones who, after a century, still feel that they can carry this burden, and get it right this time.

Oh. Good. Good, then. He can put this down now.

…

…

Except, holding it up now sort of feels like it’s the only thing holding him together anymore.

There’s that hollowness inside him, that he’s had since he walked, half-delirious, out of what was probably the Abyss itself. The magic of an ancient silver dragon helped to heal it, a little, but…

… but it was like filling an empty cup, not repairing the hole. A temporary solution, not a final fix. And now the energy is flowing out of him again, like water through his shaking fingers. It feels as wrong and clumsy as the metaphor implies. He should be able to hold this power, leverage it, like he can cup his hands to catch water. He has held this power, in the past. He looked an Archdevil in the eye and told him to stop and he obeyed.

Now there’s something wrong. Now it feels like the only thing holding him together anymore is the need for him to stay strong. To be this thing that the world needs of him. He doesn’t… there isn’t anything else he can do. He can’t put it down. He’s afraid of what will be left if he does.

He’s afraid of what will be left if he doesn’t.

Ksxksskrth is the first to know something is deeply, deeply wrong.

”My lord,” he hisses, in the tongue of shadows, ”it is done. You can let go now.”

”Put it down,” he insists in the same tongue.

To the same response. Nothing.

“… Ssssstop hhhhhim!” he croaks in the common tongue, his hissing voice listing strangely like a whistling wind.

Then the summoning anchor made by his master cracks under the pressure he’s under, and the speaking shadow is returned to his home plane.

On the Material Plane, a wizard blinks.

She's no longer the only one in the room other than the stranger. An aasimar entered some time ago, singing. Terendelev and Hulrun both stopped by, but their business elsewhere was too urgent to wait. That elf girl is here for some reason. Several angels burst out of the Wardstone and flew Woundward.

And then she heard some very emphatic instructions, from something not quite aligned with this reality, Dopplering as it zoomed back to wherever it came from.

She considers this as she taps the stranger for another minute of Resistance, as she has every 48 seconds since his fugue began.

"Elf girl," she says.

"Yes?" says the elf girl, pausing her humming along to the Song of Elysium.

"Should I stop him?" she asks. (It doesn't really occur to her that the elf girl might not have context for the question, or that she probably isn't a relevant authority.)

(None of that occurs to Ember either, so that's fine.)

"Yes," she murmurs, walking over. "...I'll need to help him, when you do. He's being very silly."

Nenio nods. "I know of a cure for this."

She slaps him in the face with all of the strength in her wiry frame.

The slap connects, and the pain jostles him enough to realize that, you know what, maybe a good first step is removing his hand from the Wardstone.

He does that. From there, withdrawing the weight of the burden to the angels inside is straightforward. Physical contact with the enchantments inside was kind of important.

“Thanks,” he says, a little distantly, to the wizard who rather literally smacked some sense into him. He is aware enough to note that when the wizard smacks sense into you, you’ve been very dumb indeed. Oops.

Then he promptly falls over, because standing is doing a thing and he’s not going to be doing any things for the foreseeable future.

Ember catches him in her arms as he falls, for all that she's a dangerously skinny child and he's a grown man.

"You did something very brave," she says as she begins her work and the world fades to soothing black. "And very good. And it wasn't the best way you could have done it, but maybe it was the best way you could have done it and still be you..."

He has no idea what that last part means, or why a random child is here and also attempting to comfort him about his questionable choices.

Fortunately, he can solve this problem by ceasing to be conscious.

How sure is he that the problem will be solved? She's still there when he wakes up.

On the other hand, he hurts less, and there's less of a sucking void at the center of him. And he's in a remarkably soft bed.

Okay, admittedly going unconscious mostly just delays problems instead of solving them, but, well. Usually they delay them any.

"Mmmmhhi," he mumbles. He then gets to checking if he's been looted again. Has he been looted again??

His accessories are intact, but his armor has been appropriated; he is instead wearing a gold-embroidered white silk nightshirt. His weapons have been polished and are sitting on the bedside table, atop a (mercifully black) outfit that looks entirely too fancy. This entire room is too fancy. The girl looks wildly out-of-place; she's been bathed, and she's wearing a well-made black dress, but it doesn't have any gold thread on it.

"Hello," she says serenely. "I asked my friend if we could stay with him. I thought you wouldn't want too many people knowing where you were... that's scary, sometimes."

Honestly he doesn't even mind if his armor got looted. In context, probably not, but he was mostly wearing it for the get out of death for free bonus. The rest of his stuff essentially makes it entirely superfluous. ... Eugh, the nightshirt is white. This feels icky and wrong, even if he acknowledges that it makes sense with an outfit that looks much more acceptably black based.

"A bit, yeah. That's very kind of you, thank you. Um. I'm Veron, pleasure to meet you?"

"Yes! I'm glad to meet you too... people call me Ember. I've never gotten to talk about things with someone else like me. Would you like some soup?" She offers him a warm bowl of greens in rich vegetable stock. "I don't think you've been eating enough."

(She says this, apparently without taking notice of the irony in doing so while every bone in her body would be visible from the right angle.)

"I haven't been," he agrees, because he really didn't find the time. He hasn't even been able to go shopping yet!

... But he does notice that she also needs to eat more. This little elf girl is also the type to absolutely forget to eat, isn't she. Well, he knows how to combat this.

"Sure, if you'll have some too? A meal's better shared."

"I don't eat," she says simply, handing it over. "Or... I haven't. In a long time."

He will accept this, then. ... And nibble at it, he guesses. As much as one nibbles at soup, anyway.

"Why not?"

She tilts her head, birdlike. "I don't because I don't need to. I don't need to because... I'm not sure, really. I suppose I grew out of it, when I became the thing we are."

That's the second time she's mentioned 'thing that we are.'

"... You're an outsider-alike? Huh. ... I still need to eat, I feel ripped off. Do you need any weird things for your maintenance?" That he could perhaps go fetch, because he's an adventurer and that means you go on ridiculous side quests for people that help you, just because you can.

"Oh! Yeah, okay. I can see that. ... Probably still counts as outsider-alike, mind. I think outsiders get this sort of, er..." He waves vaguely. "Self knowledge for free, without all of the, er, stuff to get it? And I guess not as, uh, open ended as what I've got. Maybe it's only a little like being an outsider. Anyway, you should meet Deekin, he's got the thing too, and he's got a better knowledge of, uh. This kind of stuff??"

Also he's way better at putting explanatory concepts into words. That too.

Another giggle. She kicks her feet. "Yeah, I think outsiders are a bit more like what you are than what I am... but I didn't bring you here to get an explanation, I brought you here because I needed to explain something to you!"

She worries a spot in her cheek, trying to think of what to say. Soot speaks up instead. "Stupid."

"Soot! That's not - well." She shakes her head and takes a deep breath. "...it wasn't a good idea, what you did with the angels. I know you know it wasn't a good idea. But it was a worse idea than that."

"... Yeah uh, especially after my, uh. Other big dumb idea," he winces. "But yeah, uh. Go ahead with. The how."

"...me and you, and people like us. We have something that isn't like what other people have. Other people are just blood and meat and souls and magic, and they do things that blood and meat and souls and magic do. We used to be like that, but something changed. You learned your Name. I... um."

Ember rubs at the terrible burn scars all over her body, some of them still black.

"And now, it's not quite the same? We've still got all of that stuff. But it's not most of us. It's not the part that matters, anymore. We're a story. A story that tells itself. And - and sometimes the story is wrong. And you fight it. But that's a story too? And - anyway, when you're a story you can do things you couldn't do with your meat or your magic. Like telling demons to be nicer to themselves, like stealing light into Hell."

She pauses.

"And you're... still a story... but... some of you is missing? There's a lot of... context that isn't there... your story is big and powerful but it doesn't quite feel like it's about you."

He needs a few moments to parse that, but honestly, it's not as bad as talking to the Seer during her moments of being extra Seer-y. He... thinks he can understand?? Maybe?

"... My extra," he decides that even if the elf child is not a child he should avoid cursing in front of her on principle, "uh, epic nonsense, is missing, you mean? ... That would explain the emptiness I'm feeling, wouldn't it, yeah. The, er, blood and meat and soul and magic is all there, it's the extra nonsense that's missing. So, when I went and did some epic nonsense with the angels, I wasn't playing with a full deck. Metaphysically, not just being really extremely dumb."

"Yes... and, the thing is, a lot of your story is still happening, with kindly shadows and candles in the cold. And if you keep going, you'll get back into it. But when someone in a story does something that's brave and good and a bad idea, and their story isn't quite sure what it's about, sometimes the story is about how the world isn't kind to people who are brave and good and have bad ideas. And there are enough stories like that."

She gets a bit vehement towards the end, then covers her mouth. "Sorry."

"Don't be, you're absolutely right," he assures, nodding firmly. "So. Keep being myself, but be less of a," still not cursing, "dunce about it. For metaphysical reasons along with the obvious reasons of, you know. Not being stupid, luck running out at some point, all that."

"Yes. More is at stake than your life. Even though your life matters a lot."

He nods, firmly. Yeah. It's been about more than just him for a while, hasn't it, just. It's easy to forget, sometimes. He thinks of his estate on the Plane of Shadow, and what would happen to it if he, for example, took a wish from a demon and became Chaotic Evil. Yeah uh. Yeah that'd be bad. Don't be stupid, Veron: do it for the people relying on you, if for some reason you can't seem to value your own skin.

An aasimar dressed just as outrageously as his furnishings knocks on the door as he opens it, smiling radiantly. "Ember, you could have messaged me that our guest had awoken. I'm caught out entirely, I'm not even dressed for the occasion. And you fed him! Now what am I to do with his breakfast?"

A cart wheels in behind him, squeaking under the weight of enough pastry, eggs, meat, fruit, and little marzipan sculptures to provision a regiment. The obvious nobleman bows deeply. "My name is Daeran Arendae; I have too many titles to burden you with this early in the morning, but my favorite is Count of Roses, which I was assigned due to my nature as a beautiful and superficial prick. You, I hear, are our savior, the shadow-slayer, the one who restored the Wardstone, and... possibly Terendelev's cousin? There's some confusion on that point."

Veron is a little taken aback. Mostly by the food. There's a lot of food, and it's very. Itself. Little... marzipan sculptures??? How are you supposed to eat that, especially without feeling guilty??

"... Just Veron's fine. Her cousin? Where did..." Oh, Deekin did turn into a silver dragon and also fly around causing havoc. It stands to reason that people might think she has a cousin of some kind. "... No, I'm not her cousin. Pleasure to meet you, thank you for your hospitality."

"Veron," Daeran says, rolling it around on his tongue in a needlessly salacious way. "It could be Chelish or Varisian, but the way you said it definitely isn't. I like that. Varisia is completely played-out, and Cheliax, well! I'd spit, but this floor is honed marble, and I'm not ruining it unless it's very funny."

"... Right. Uh. No, not Varisia or Cheliax, I'm from a plane called Toril. The Silver Marches, if you want a specific location or whatever."

"Oh, lovely," Daeran says. "Silver is good. Very nearly as good as gold." (He runs his fingers through his hair, in case Veron missed the joke; it has the fairly common aasimar trait of not just being blonde but having the luster of actual gold, only a few shades paler.)

"I've always liked copper," Ember says wistfully. "It's beautiful when it shines, and then it goes green and it's pretty then too..."

Daeran looks over at her with his first unaffected smile of the day. "I'll admit it has a certain draw. ...anyway. Veron. I wouldn't ordinarily ask anything in return for my beneficence, especially not when it was Ember who brought you in. But I am in position to achieve something I have only dreamed of."

He doesn't have the heart to tell this guy that as far as he knows, the reason it's called 'The Silver Marches' is because it's really cold, and almost constantly covered in snow. Sure, sure, precious metals, yeah, definitely.

"Okay? What's the favor?"

"Bring me with you to meet with the Prelate and his benefactor, when you do. And wear this."

He offers a cloakpin brooch with the emblem of a golden rose.

"If you want to check that it isn't enchanted, I've got a vial of Arcane Sight oil around here somewhere."

".... This is to imply that we're together, isn't it," he sighs, already seeing where this is going.

Daeran folds his arms across his chest.

"You know, most people would assume I was trying to embroil you in political intrigue," he points out.

"I don't think I would," Ember says.

"But he's never even met me!"

"You are being very intensely yourself."

"You really are, mate. This feels too petty for political intrigue. Is this just to unsettle the Prelate?? There have got to be better ways to weird him out than just vaguely implying we might've," still not cursing in front of Ember! "had relations."

"Unsettling him is easy," Daeran says, falling forcefully onto the foot of the mattress. (It's big enough that he's got room to do it without endangering Veron's feet.) "He's unsettled every time someone doesn't mutter benedictions to Iomedae when they pass wind. What I want is to give him a fit, ideally one so extreme that Terendelev has to hold him back from slicing me stem to stern."

He begins talking mostly to himself. "The dream scenario would be if you'd been confused enough by the implication that you didn't deny my having had my way with you, and then while his veins popped I told him about how your heroism and other positive qualities had convinced me that I needed to do something meaningful, and so I intended to liquidate one of my estates to fund reconstruction of the city center, with grand new temples to Desna, Milani and Calistria... I'd need a solid reason to include Calistria, but I really think I could have made it work. But you had to be perceptive about it."

Snort.

"Fine, give it. Those are the local Good deities, except for Calistria, from context?"

"They're two of them. Desna covers luck and butterflies and... solutions that shouldn't work... and Milani is Iomedae's rebellious sister, who desires nothing more than the overthrow of tyranny. And Calistria is the goddess of whores and vengeance, and the only deity I genuinely respect. And... give what? The brooch?"

"Yep. The brooch. I never said I wouldn't, I just wanted to be clear on what I was signing up for, here." He wrinkles his nose. "I don't much like vengeance, as a concept, is there another local deity that would annoy him? If you want to go foreign, you could try Eilistraee. The Dark Maiden allegedly dances naked under the moonlight, seems right up your alley."

Daeran hands over the brooch and thinks about it.

"It's not actually her aspect of vengeance that calls best to me. Though I do like that too. It's... there are gods of glory everywhere. There are a thousand gods of art and family and song. There are gods of murder and pestilence, too, in case you need those. Every grand, world-striding concept you can think of, gods fight over its scraps like dogs in the street. But Calistria... Calistria looked on those who have nothing to give but their own bodies, those who perfect the oldest art, the ones who have to be braver than any crusader and get spat on for it, and she said them. I'm for them. I'll take you if you're empty and you have to fill the void, and I'll take you if you've got nothing except the determination to do what anyone in the world can do." He smiles very sharply. "And that's why Hulrun hates her. Not for vengeance; he loves vengeance. He hates her for loving the whores."

"... I guess you don't have an Ilmater equivalent here, do you. I suppose I have some issues with the holes in your pantheon, but that's hardly your or Her fault. Fine. Just try to steer it towards the loving the whores aspect more than the vengeance aspect, yeah? Call it to make him mad."

Daeran's smile softens a bit. "I can accept many things, in the name of more effectively pissing off Hulrun Shappok. Ember, would you like to attend this legendary conversation?"

Ember wrinkles her nose. "Hulrun is very afraid of me, and I don't like conversations about gods. I think I'll visit the gardens and see if any of the animals survived and need help."

Aw!! What an excellent thing to be doing instead! He envies her, that sounds much better than what he's doing. Also, he wishes he could heal. (He had a ring that did Cure Light Wounds once a day, from Drogan; he misses it dearly and really hopes he can get it back, for more than just sentimental reasons. He could just heal things sometimes without it being a waste of resources!)

"I should probably be yelled at by various people before I go assist with tweaking noses." Deekin's going to be pissed. "Deekin might help you with your, er, thing, he's the one who turned into the silver dragon."

"Like I said: it wasn't necessarily the best way to do it. But it might have been the only way you could do it and still be you."

She exits the room, humming.

Daeran raises an eyebrow. "So he isn't a dragon? Your... Deekin. And he enjoys tweaking noses?"

"Deekin's a kobold. Which is arguably on the dragon spectrum somewhere, and he's definitely got dragon blood in him and might at some point figure out how to become a full dragon, but. Right now: winged, silver kobold. And yeah, he does, sometimes, when it's..." He waves a hand, vaguely. "... 'Narratively satisfying'? Or something."

Daeran hops to his feet.

"In that case, I must meet him as well. If our tweaking of Hulrun is narratively unsatisfying, why do it at all?"

"... I really couldn't say?"

What has he done. It's not like he can abort this plan now, either, they will now inevitably run into each other. He is mildly frightened of the chaos that will almost certainly result, but Deekin will probably have fun, so. That likely makes it worth it.

Anyway if he's allowed to get up, he'll get on the (mercifully black) clothes, and rearm himself and whatnot. And also steal various food that wouldn't make him feel guilty to eat. This mostly involves avoiding the marzipan sculptures, because again: why.

Daeran picks one up, a gorgeously detailed silver dragon, and thoughtfully bites its head off.

"Mm. I do see the appeal."

... Why does that feel like an innuendo of some kind. Probably because he was putting on clothes and the timing was suspect. Is he being hit on again? Nevermind, he doesn't want to know. He will pretend the answer is no and he will feel much better about it that way.

(He similarly notices and suppresses a wince about biting the head off a marzipan dragon. That's a bit on the nose, isn't it? Nevermind, on to other topics.)

"You know, I'm not used to being the one to find Deekin. Usually he'd be the one showing up at my bedside for maximally efficient yelling. ... Or waiting just outside. Hm." Is Deekin waiting just outside??

Invisibly, yes. He looks up as Veron opens the door and gives him a look.

(Deekin isn't as stealthy as his Boss. But one does pick up some things.)

Yeah, uh. Yeah.

He sits down nearby, and looks at his feet. He does not give away Deekin's location, but it's obvious who this apology is addressed to, isn't it.

"I uh. I am aware now of all of the ways I was really, incredibly stupid, and reckless, and, uh, blighting crazy. And I am really very sorry to anyone that has the phenomenal patience and fortitude to put up with my bullshit. I appreciate them all very much, and care about them, and know I scare them every single time I shove my head up my ass. I, erm, can't promise I won't be a blighting dumbass ever again, I kind of have this crippling weakness for people suffering in front of me, but. ... I think I've been getting better? A bit?? Um. And again, sorry, and I will. Continue to work on that and hopefully one day get to the point where I will... not do incredibly dumb shit all by myself where no one can smack me and tell me not to. But. Uh. Yeah. Sorry. The wish thing was almost certainly the dumbest thing I've ever done, and when your list of 'dumb shit' includes 'looking directly at a medusa' that's, uh. Yeah. I'll do better."

Deekin revisibles.

"Deekin think going after medusa while medusa looking for Mythallar and boss had Mythallar in pocket dumber," he says contemplatively. "- than looking at medusa. Not dumber than taking Wish from demon. Taking Wish from demon dumber than anything Deekin remember."

Snorts. "Yeah. That was dumber. But the Wish is the new number one, for sure. I - I made it a really good Wish, but. I shouldn't have taken that chance at all, even with my clever wording and the whole, playing demons against devils for the benefit of everyone else thing. The risk wasn't worth it, if the magic successfully got its hooks into me and made me... like it..." He shudders. "It would have been bad. Really, really bad. Uh. I was. Only thinking of myself, frankly, and that I'm the great big hero who needs to save the world by myself or whatever, and. That's not true. I've got you, and I should treat you accordingly. Sorry. Really. I will not be taking another Wish from anyone sketchy ever again, and will furthermore work harder to not be some kind of adventurer-shaped lemming, running top speed for any cliffs that look vaguely tempting."

"At least bring Deekin for cliffdives. Deekin got wings for a reason."

Pause. "What wording? Deekin want to write down."

"Yes, Deekin. Sorry, Deekin."

He pauses too, then gives a small grin, because he is kind of proud of himself for his Wish, actually.

"Dissolving the contracts that were keeping souls in Hell that wanted to go elsewhere. Uh - exact wording was, like, squidgy and metaphysical? There was a loop about going through past contracts and finding the ones cheapest to dissolve - by my terms, not hers - and doing as many as possible before running out of power or blowing up or something. It probably still threw a bunch of them into nasty afterlives anyway, but, you know. Different ones."

Deekin squints.

"Probably did a lot of good," he allows. "But Boss need to remember specifics better next time, or Deekin have to interview demon."

Daeran clears his throat. "I would ask if you are the Deekin spoken of by my companion, but, ah. You have helpfully introduced yourself."

"Oh, come on!! That's more specific than usual, even!! It was, like, based off of my sincere desire and how I would want to have done it if I sat down to grind my nose against a stack of contracts by hand, how can I possibly relate that kind of shit!!!" cries Veron, offended.

"Write down! Deekin give you scrivener's notebook if needed!"

Deekin glances over at the Count and bows, flaring his pale wings out and back like a cape in the wind.

"Count Arendae, Deekin presume? Deekin offer sincerest thanks for hospitality."

Daeran smiles and bows in return. "Count Arendae thanks Deekin as well, for gracing this petty estate. Does Deekin have need of refreshment?"

"No, Deekin already use little kobolds' room. Deekin hear Count Arendae want to piss off Prelate Shappok? Deekin support this goal. Deekin have notes."

Veron has the faint feeling that he's doomed and the conversation is going to veer entirely out of his control.

"... Do I have any steering privileges for how things are going to go, or have I lost those while I'm out here in the dog house?"

"Deekin worry that Boss's judgement impaired," Deekin says pleasantly. "Waiting for evidence to contrary."

That's a yes, then.

He sighs dramatically, but doesn't protest.

"Do you even need me here, then? Just tell me where I'll be standing and what I'm in for. I've still got to apologize to Ksxksskrth. Uh. Multiple times, probably."

Deekin nods distractedly, drawing out some kind of concept web diagram. "Say hi for Deekin."

Then he starts pointing at the diagram. "Count Arendae very good at playing crowd, but rely heavily on specific tropes. Audience get jaded - more sexual depravity and blasphemy and wasted luxury always possible, but increasingly expensive, sometimes morally risky. Deekin propose variants, Daeran say yea or nay? First: Daeran approach Prelate with air of deep sorrow and contrition, emphasizing possibility of redemption, before revealing reason for cloak-turn is Boss, heavily implying but not stating incredible sexual prowess..."

(Daeran is rapt.)