"Thank you," he murmurs.

"Of course."

"You said they specialize?"

"Yes, but I included them all anyway just to be safe."

"Sensible. What are their specialties?"

She lists them.

"...Interesting," he says when she's done.

"It's a little haphazard."

"It certainly...has an aesthetic."

"Yes. It does."

He raises an eyebrow.

"The Valar and everything else were set in motion by a greater being called Eru whose motivation was aesthetic and whose aesthetic is tragedy. He has been convinced to cut it out. He now judges poetry contests."

"...Ah."

"Yep."

"I hate to ask, but how sure are you that he's been convinced to cut it out?"

"The Valar have received extra power as he's stepped it down, nothing tragic has happened since then, and he does judge a lot of very sad poetry and such, but if he did wish to fake it he could. I think faking it would be stylistically inconsistent at least as regards the people I knew about but it wouldn't floor me to learn that this place was a secret side project."

"It would also not floor me to learn that the plan was some kind of horrible war between the Great Mages and the Valar," he says soberly.

"I can suggest that they evacuate the place?"

"That might be for the best," he says, making a slight face. "But some people won't want to go."

"You're the native expert and the Valar will listen to me; if you have recommendations I'd be eager to hear them."

"This is very much a game-changer, I'm still trying to gather information and weigh options," he says. "Thus far my plan was to wait until I had enough Genoshan-born Great Mages like Odette to hold a counter-coup, essentially. Not a very elegant plan, of course, but..."

"How many did you expect to be enough?"

"Depending on factors impossible to determine in advance, anywhere from two to ten, but likely at least four."

"Well. There are fourteen Valar, they may have dissimilar exact skill distributions but I'd be surprised if they couldn't match up one to one overall, and some Maiar may also count."

"I am glad to hear that."