Ferrer Maillol: "Cheliax was Taldor and mostly still is Taldor, but is in the process of being reformed by a newly ascendant Queen who has negotiated a pact with the wise and benevolent Asmodeus.  Asmodeus's Church would be displeased by that sort of thing happening without good reason, but would, in this case, weigh the many problems in this country and decide that keeping Keltham happy was far more than enough good reason."

"Palace has plenty of dignified-looking people with very high Splendour who could pull it off, I think the main delay is going to be waiting on somebody who can cast Detect Thoughts so we can ask about his Nidal infiltrator theory too."

Carissa Sevar: "All right. Another option, because I think he's going to want to talk about exclusivity in a little while, is to have someone drop in and ask him if they can rent me, and give a justification along these lines." Carissa has a hard time pinning down a lot of her intuitions about Keltham but she expects that he will have some kind of feelings about 'look, she's into stuff that's much more serious than you are prepared to offer', and if that take is given by someone with an obvious self-interest then it's also easier if it's disastrous for him to reject it without reaching any far-reaching conclusions about Cheliax. Also, whether he ends up agreeing or not he'll end up wanting to learn the skills he doesn't have, and also it seems like fertile territory for 'things he might turn out to be into'. 

Ferrer Maillol: "My read on Keltham is that there are some kinds of people to whom he'll show some tiny fraction of what we consider elementary deference, Contessa Lrilatha being the most obvious.  His interactions with senior Security also seem promising.  If the person trying to rent you isn't wearing a visible +6 headband, it seems less likely that Keltham will process them as - whoever he thinks he's supposed to listen to.  And if we send in somebody like that, why are they trying to rent you and not a hundred other women they could afford?"

Carissa Sevar: This is a fantastic question someone should ask the Queen.

She doesn't say that, not that not saying it much limits the damage of thinking it. "Fair enough. I guess it can wait on someone who can manage the Detect Thoughts."

Ferrer Maillol: "That's it.  If you've got nothing else, go prepare spells."

Maillol is in fact concerned about the degree to which Sevar seems to be developing genuine attachment for Keltham, but the last time she spoke out of that attachment she made tremendous progress on Keltham, because it fit into whatever mysterious theories he uses.  Maillol still thinks, on the whole, that in the ordinary course of Asmodeus's Law he would not correct her yet.  Of course, that would be because he was regarding her as a disposable pawn, but if that's what Sevar proves to be, so be it.

Carissa Sevar: Carissa asks after, and receives, a room next to Keltham's, smaller than his and less 'doom-punk', clearly meant for the entourage of the person in the main room but not meant for their slaves. She prepares spells.

Ferrer Maillol: Maillol files a request for someone at eighth circle who can cast Detect Thoughts, and/or somebody with very high Splendour who can talk to Keltham about the mystery of where he's getting his deductions and also talk with him about Carissa Sevar's sexuality, specifically about her need to be in somebody else's power, and possibly also (he's not sure how the details of this could look but he's not the one with the Splendour) manage to introduce the topic of (somebody else?) wanting to rent Sevar from Keltham in a way that won't set him off or look wildly implausible.

Maillol isn't going to realize for a while the incredible depth and thoroughness of the blunder he's just committed, and by the time he does, it will be far too late.

Keltham: Keltham tries to recollect what he can of the items in Ione's list that seemed at all interesting, as now seen from a somewhat different standpoint - he can't recollect much of it, though, that visibly helps a lot under the new conditions - spends some time figuring stuff out, spends more time trying to figure out if he can do any better, and then prays.

He does receive his spells this time, though with no sense of his own god looking back.

Keltham now has:

0th:  Detect Magic, Guidance, what should be Detect Poison, what should be Create Water.

(Create Water seems like the most munchkinable thing that's a cantrip.  Which isn't very munchkinable, but at 4 gallons per caster circle, maybe he can do something with repeatably suddenly 16 gallons of water, in an emergency situation.)

1st:  Truthspell x3, Fairness x2, Sanctuary, Protection, Comprehend Languages.

2nd:  Augury x3, Owl's Wisdom, Early Judgment.

Taking the Early Judgment spell seems a little unsafe, like they'd only sell that magic in a Shop of Ill-Advised Consumer Goods because it's too potentially addictive.  But it also seems important to have around at least for today in case he needs to make a mental recovery.

3rd:  (used on 2 1sts and a 2nd)

4th:  Enchantment Foil, what should be Sending.

Keltham: That leaves him with some time left while Carissa preps spells, which he'll first use to Prestidigitate his clothing clean over the sink in the ensuite bathroom (not that Keltham is remembering to be appreciative of this incredible luxury).

Then Keltham attempts to think for a bit, his thoughts tentatively trying out a review of recent events, before he concludes that in fact he shouldn't do that and should try to decompress more instead, while he's alone by himself in the quiet but for the sound of rain outside.

He'll poke through the fourteen-volume history on 'Absalom', which becomes more interesting after it becomes clear that Absalom is where the Starstone resides.  The quality of the reasoning in the history books is something like six times better than those of the books in the villa library, more like 1 reasoning error per 2 sentences instead of 3 reasoning errors per 1 sentence.

...is that because the palace can afford better books than - but why - why would - books, information, you should just be able to reprint the best versions of things if the information exists - do more intelligent authors demand incredibly high book royalties to the point where most people can't afford good information about basic subjects?  Golarion why.

The book's contents seem to be dated to before Aroden died, which, if Keltham is recalling correctly, was a century ago.  Maybe that's at least how long it took for the slightly smarter and better-reasoned book to have its copyright decay to where it could sell enough copies to be worth printing?  Golarion, again, why?  Information is very easy to copy once it exists; information on core topics is among the most blatant possible cases where Civilization has an interest in everybody being able to afford it.

All the altruistic smart people are off being wizards at the Worldwound, maybe.

Carissa Sevar: Carissa knocks on his door an hour later.

Keltham: "Enter."

Carissa Sevar: Carissa finds it encouraging how quickly he is warming up to this! She'll enter. ...and kneel at his side over in the reading nook, if that's what he's doing. She has never done this before and feels faintly ridiculous but what's important is whether Keltham is into it.

dath ilan: ('Enter' would actually be among the things you'd say in Baseline, if somebody knocked, and it wouldn't especially be a command.  It's just that 'it's okay by me if you want to come in' would be more syllables than Civilization would choose to encode into a query-response pattern that gets used like over a billion times a day.)

Keltham: And now Carissa is on her knees on the pillow beside the reading nook.  Obviously no such custom exists in Civilization and kneeling itself wouldn't mean anything there, but it's clearly a standard thing given the pillow beside the reading nook.

He doesn't ask what this clearly standard thing standardly encodes, because part of him seems to feel that the meaning is, somehow, obvious.  Not all of it, and maybe he's completely wrong; it just obviously seems like something that you wouldn't do, unless you are to him what Carissa is to him, so it means, at least, that.

He reaches over and ruffles her hair, because that feels right.  "Hey," he says.

Carissa Sevar: "Hey. I have reported to Security and prepared my spells and been assigned a room, though yours is fancier. I think they like you better, probably because of how you're going to bring about the technological revolution and make the world a place Zon-Kuthon won't consent to permitting to exist."

Keltham: "Well, if your room isn't fancy at all, maybe I'll go complain.  Your room being fancy and my room being fancier seems like a reasonable premise for a relationship like this one."

"Any updates from Security on Ione, Pilar, Asmodia, gods, or timelines on project resume?"

Carissa Sevar: Lean. "Ione's not awake yet, they threw some fancier healing at her in case that helps, this isn't very much of a bad sign though if it's still true this evening it will be. Pilar's back. She ended up in Elysium - the Chaotic Good afterlife - for some reason! I didn't ask more questions because that sort of thing can be personal but I bet she'd tell you about it, if you ask. Asmodia's not back yet - Pilar ended up elevated priority because they wanted to ask her questions about how she ended up in our mission out of the villa -- but it sounds like she doesn't know any more than we do. Asmodia's going to require a seventh circle spell - Regenerate - because of her legs, so she might be a week or so, in wartime like this. 

I asked if I could help with the war effort but was told to stay focused on this.

I think they're ready to resume once you are - they could set up a room here for classes - but don't want to push you, if you're not ready."

Keltham: Keltham is a bit startled that Carissa would just tell him that Pilar ended up in Elysium.  That should've been something he had to figure out on his own by talking to Pilar, or investigating her, or something.  Pilar should've been left more mysterious than that until their first date, or until he did something to appeal to her, if those tropes were governing here.  Call it maybe 6 times as likely on the theory 'Chelish Governance asked Pilar "what" and found out a weird thing and promptly and sensibly told Carissa so she could tell me' as on the theory 'this is an ero-LARP'.  With possible amendments if the Chaotic Good thing turns out to be itself much more mysterious; but still, Keltham making the first discovery that starts the mystery trail should require that he start Pilar's route, like, at all?  Or maybe that happened when she took a +3 vicious nasty bigsword for him.

But still a surprise, not advance-predicted, not the main thing the theory obviously says.  You don't want to rationalize those out the window.  Maybe call it 3:1 instead of 6:1, though.

"Well, huh," Keltham says, "the details there would be a bit hard to explain, but that's some small evidence against the reasoning system I was using to infer that one of the girls is a secret Zon-Kuthon cleric, or that one of the more unusual girls in class will have the 'being-forced' fetish.  Not decisive or anything, but noticeable jolt.  The key is knowing how to keep track of that sort of thing over time, which is what I'd otherwise have planned to lecture on next, the Law for accumulating pieces of evidence that aren't individually decisive, until they add up to something."

"Asmodia's going to - end up pretty behind, in a week, at the rate we were going.  I'm not sure how much you can recover from that sort of thing by reading notes, in a situation like this one... well, maybe somebody else could teach Asmodia, to help solidify the material in their own minds by teaching it, that's a big part of the reason why older kids teach younger ones in dath ilan.  Still, that'd be a big chunk of someone's time.  Depending on how expensive a seventh-circle Regenerate is... well, except that they are going to do it at all, eventually, so we're not paying from zero.  I probably want to expend some political capital on it happening earlier, if the project is considered competitive with war demands at all."

"I could teach a class today, for sure.  Whether I should... maybe not so much, if the view-from-above says that somebody in my position is supposed to take one day off, and it probably does."

Carissa Sevar: - telling Keltham about Pilar was a correct move in the Second Law game. Okay. Carissa doesn't understand why and would REALLY LIKE someone to read Keltham's thoughts and try to get more but it's - information, and as Keltham says, you can use a little of that at a time. "It might literally be cheaper to pass Asmodia a two-way mirror in Hell so she can keep up," she says. "But I think it's reasonable to press them on getting her back sooner."

Keltham: ...they can do that?  Neat.  "I've got no objection to that if it's cheaper, key thing is Asmodia can ask questions from where she is and get them answered.  Pass it to them next time you see them? - ahem."

"Pass it to them the next time you see them, unless I tell you that I've passed it on first."

(Or is this not a giving-orders occasion?!  One thing is for sure, he needs to not just ask Carissa what he's allowed to do!  Brain registers a desire to scream internally:  Approved:  AAAAHHHHHHH WHY CAN'T ANYONE LEGIBLE IN GOLARION!?  Thank you brain now shut up, if that was an error it wasn't a critical error, and eventually things will be fine.)

Carissa Sevar: "Will do." (Carissa would kill quite a large number of people to be able to read Keltham's mind right now.)

Keltham: Is this obedience turning him on?  Yes it is, apparently, and furthermore his mind feels blank if he tries to figure out what else to talk to her about, so.  "You're allowed to start pestering me for sex again, by the way, since it's now morning.  No promises, of course, but you're allowed to try."

Carissa Sevar: "Before yesterday turned out so eventful I was planning to show you what I got from the fancy Ostenso sex shop! And maybe invite you to come with me sometime but that's looking less likely, now. Maybe they can bring a selection to us."

Keltham: "Well that sounds promising.  What new outfits or toys have I unlocked after our latest relationship progress?"

Carissa Sevar: "I actually bought this outfit there! Should I tell you why they sell it at a sex shop not a normal tailors' or would you rather experiment."

Keltham: "Now that's the dath ilani equivalent of asking a duke's son if he's too scared to go rhinoceros racing."

Experimentation follows.

Keltham: The experiment is a success.  More resources are allocated to following up on these discoveries.

Keltham: ...this scientific investigation might possibly be threatening to get a little out of control and investigate subject matters that could perhaps be regarded as dangerous without a verified sufficient level of safety precautions.

Keltham accordingly restrains himself, but this is going to be pretty darned visible as a fact if you have Carissa's Sense Motive opposing what passes for Keltham's Bluff.

Carissa Sevar: Carissa's mostly playing by intuition, lately, on a moment by moment basis, but she's aware that most of the point of seducing people for strategic reasons is that you can get strategic concessions out of them when their judgment is compromised. And also that dath ilan would definitely know this and advise their kids against it. So, we'll see who is better at this, Cheliax or dath ilan. 

She pulls herself away, sits cross-legged, folds her hands, tries to look - like she's trying hard not to say anything, like she's sad and not quite pretending otherwise but certainly not trying to put it in his way -

Keltham: Keltham attempts to roll his Sense Cognitive Background State, devises a guess.

"Uh... if I trust my ability to read you, you look like somebody with a problem she'd usually and normally hide because that's what normal people in Golarion do in this situation, but you remembered that I asked you to err on the side of a lot more visibility, and now you're wobbling between that request and the reason why a normal person would usually hide that."

"I won't ask followup questions until I've either been told my current guess is wrong, or I've received some indication from you that you've reached your own estimate, using the information you have and I don't, that it is safe for me to inquire further."

Done, flaming shit that was hard to phrase without asking her to make a decision instead of him.  If this doesn't rapidly get easier with practice, Keltham is going to use his Unilateral Relationship Decisions Power to metadecide that he gets to ask Carissa to decide things ever.

Carissa Sevar: "I think maybe people would hide this in dath ilan too, actually? On the principle that - uh, it seems wildly more important than not pressuring people into sex. But your orders take precedence. I think. If I calculated that wrong, well, probably we will calculate lots of things wrong at first."

Keltham: "I need an explicit statement of your guess, using the information you have that I don't, that it's okay for me to ask more questions; I have no idea what you're potentially protecting me from right now, or what costs there are to my knowing something that's supposed to be unknown to me or even just illegible."

Carissa Sevar: "It is fine for you to ask more questions!"

Keltham: There's a very distinct ouch of realizing that he may have pressed her too hard, just then, to be legible and not subtle, when on the meta-level discussing safety.  But - she'll survive, she promised him that.

"Kay.  What's wrong?"

Carissa Sevar: "You think that there's a - substantial chance, not a large one, but one worth planning around, that I am actually lying to you about having reliable contraception and planning to, I guess, get pregnant and then run off before anyone notices to some country where I wouldn't be legally obliged to have an abortion. And. I understand why the chance of that doesn't have to be very large to be very important to you. And I understand that you don't have much reason to trust me, though I and I think your god have been trying to give you some. And I understand that none of that matters and you can have the stupidest reason in the world and it's fine, it's your choice, you can have whatever you want from me and it doesn't have to be -

Carissa Sevar: ....but it does make me sad. And I don't see why you'd believe that, it's not - more information - but - but it does make me sad. Is all. Now you have all the information that I have."

Carissa Sevar: "...and, uh, I remain very uncertain if you actually meant me not to hide things like that, it's fine if you didn't mean that kind of thing, most people wouldn't mean that kind of thing."

Keltham: He'll gather her in to hug her.  "It is what I meant.  Thank you for not just hiding the whole thing.  I appreciate that part a lot.  And, I understand.  It's my responsibility to not be unduly influenced by you being sad.  Now that I've asked you not to hide what you'd usually hide, at least for a while."

Carissa Sevar: - snuggle. "Okay. 'm not - asking you to be influenced." Both Keltham deciding to fuck her and Keltham deciding to not care about her feelings are good outcomes, here.

Keltham: "This is usually where I would apply creativity, it's just, I have so little grasp of magic, and all the people I would otherwise ask might be, assuming the premise, in a conspiracy with you."

Though Ione might be less likely than some, but no; for purposes of deciding whether it's okay to risk having kids, he needs to assume that Ione is scripted - by Governance, not by some metalevel eroLARP - and can't be trusted either.

"I know what Science Maniac Verrez would do in this situation - namely, figure out how to use Prestidigitation to impose a magnet-field over his own sperm, the way that mature male contraception technology works in dath ilan.  But in real life, if you try that sort of thing... well, no, actually, I guess I could heal myself, if I hurt myself.  Unless I gave myself cancer.  But that, I'd guess, just takes a more powerful cleric spell.  And even if I literally kill myself, you could bring me back... but the problem is verifying that the sperm are actually dead and that the silly clever trick worked, when I can't ask anybody here to help me figure out how to verify whether sperm are alive... but there was a spell Detect Life on Ione's list, I'm pretty sure, and if I ask my god to give me that, I can see if it works on sperm and then it goes through my god rather than anyone here..."

"Or actually - potentially simpler solutions.  Is there a fourth-circle or lower spell I can ask my god to give me, that would let me create a small object that isn't as fragile as Prestidigitating that, and can have properties like, impermeability to fluid, adhesion to skin until dispelled."

Keltham is now attempting to invent birth control via condoms from scratch!  His first visualization is a small patch that fits over the tip of his urethra and will contain the liquid that emerges from it.

Carissa Sevar: ....which is neither of the good outcomes! Why is Keltham like this! "I feel like there are plenty of solutions if killing people is considered an acceptable cost and you should not do things that are at all likely to kill you!"

Keltham: "I don't actually know what would be a solution if killing people is an acceptable cost, though it sounds like it's not at all a great time to ask Cheliax to burn a resurrection on that."

"I mean - to be clear, under the circumstances - I might not be able to trust your solution, but - I admit to being pretty curious about what else Golarion will trade a heap of dead bodies for."

Keltham has entered Problem-Solving Mode!  Good work for having a Problem, Carissa!

Carissa Sevar: "Well, you could kill me, because pregnancies don't survive dying and being raised, and you could test that in advance on some other women who were pregnant and preferred not to be, if you didn't want to just trust it. Or you could kill me and then, instead of a resurrection, do a Planar Binding to bring me back from Hell, because devils can't get pregnant....I don't know how you could verify that but Asmodeus probably wouldn't bother with Cheliax if devils could just make more of themselves in Hell. I am not very impressed with these solutions but what happens to me if I die is much more definitely known and understood than what happens to you so if we're using death-related contraceptive methods, here."

Keltham: "Remind me of what your usual contraception is like.  I think you may have told me but I forgot."

Carissa Sevar: "Pregnancy also does not survive a Polymorph to any form that can't itself sustain a pregnancy, and the cheapest polymorph that's sufficient is second-circle Alter Self, so I go male and back, every night when it's potentially relevant."

Keltham: "Very easy to verify you doing," though the thought is more than slightly odd, "but the trouble is, at the appropriate level of paranoia, I have only sources inside Cheliax to tell me that Alter Self works for aborting pregnancy.  If I ask my god for a spell to detect whether you're pregnant, do you know if I get one?"

Carissa Sevar: "I don't ....think a spell for that exists. You can't tell with Detect Intelligence until 12 weeks along. You could have some pregnant people in to Alter Self in front of you?"

Keltham: Oof, that's a Cost there, if it has to be 12 weeks along, meaning they couldn't just find somebody who didn't actually want a baby and pay them to participate in the experiment.  Though maybe Cheliax has some wizards who only do the Alter Self thing after they detect, or change their minds, and advertising for one of those would turn somebody up... it doesn't really solve the main problem, though, because he can't be sure that what works at 12 weeks works at 1 hour.

"If you Alter Self immediately after sex, then shift back, would I be able to check inside you and verify that the semen had vanished?  Maybe I'd be willing to try for the further trust in that case, that semen doesn't persist in a vagina or uterus that you don't have... actually no, shit, I can't rely on that, because you could also produce that result with Prestidigitation even if it wouldn't ordinarily happen from Alter Self.  No wait, counter-2-arguendo, if you can cast Alter Self and come back fast enough, I can have Detect Magic running the whole time, check your vaginal contents before and after, and verify that Alter Self was the only magic to affect you over that period..."

This is actually kind of fascinating, as Compounding Capabilities problems go.  Maybe the eroLARP is deconstructing a computer game where the player needed to drag the spells from a list of available spells to form the correct structure to eliminate a pregnancy, before they could fuck anybody.  That sounds like how a computer-game version of an eroLARP would work.

Carissa Sevar: Carissa has this job mostly because she is much less inclined than everyone else in Cheliax to throw up her hands at Keltham and go "MY DIAGNOSIS IS THAT HE IS AN INSANE PERSON" but she's sort of feeling that, right now. "I am willing to do that if you'd like it.

I ...think probably if we were secretly a Dread Empire we'd just mind control you about this, though."

Keltham: "I appreciate and update on the argument; knowing as little as I do about mind control, or about how Hypothetical Bad Asmodeus might be concerned about my own god counterescalating, it's not enough to decide the issue.  Admittedly, if you carefully demonstrated mind control capabilities that can just completely undetectably to me make me believe or decide things, that would be a larger update than I've made so far about good Cheliax intentions; there'd still be the possibility you were in a balance against my god, but it'd be an update."

"Does that process give me the result I need to observe, on your prediction?  Detect Magic / check vagina / Alter Self / de-Alter / check vagina to verify that the process vanishes semen?"

Carissa Sevar: “- mind control can do that. I don’t know spells like that myself but I would expect high-ranking palace security do.” What an incredibly convenient way to build trust, actually, have a sufficiently high level caster cast Suggestion on him and then promise that it hasn’t otherwise been done. Which it hasn’t because Asmodeus said not to, perhaps because it was worth it …

”And I think that process works.”

Keltham: It's kind of complicated and tight, is the thing, for a poorly-tested process, he isn't sure that he can detect whether or not a vagina contains semen in the first place... but then it's basically backup against an itself-improbable conspiracy, not the primary means of birth control?

One also needs to consider that, at a sufficient level of magical power and ill intent, they could have done something clever when he had sex with Carissa the previous day, quickly moving semen from her mouth to her vagina, maybe as screened by an illusion.  Heck, they could've teleported sperm right out of his epididymis while he was sleeping in the villa the first night, before the Forbiddance went up - though they'd also have to mix it with seminal fluid to have a chance for the sperm to survive a uterus.

Keltham lets out a sigh.  "No promises, but I'll think about it, and tell you tonight whether to prepare Alter Self tomorrow."

Carissa Sevar: Well that's progress! And on some level she can - respect how careful Keltham is, respect that while he does seem to care about her more than is healthy he's not actually an idiot about it, probably almost every Chelish teenage boy would do worse....

Well. Better to keep pushing. Lightly. "I prepare it every day. Hope springs eternal and also we haven't actually talked about exclusivity yet."

Keltham: "I will... possibly maybe think about it faster, then, but this is security reasoning and can't be a quick decision.  And - exclusivity?  Like monogamy things?  I'm not quite sure what that has to do with intercourse."

Carissa Sevar: "Well, see, I am expecting you to order me not to have sex with other people without your permission but absent such orders I might, you know, proposition someone who has an incredibly cool armored vest, and then want to have my Alter Self for that."

Keltham: "Heh.  Point to you for catching me out on that, I think my brain is Assuming Things that have not been discussed.  If it wasn't just a more routine false closed-world assumption with respect to my ignorance of anybody else you wanted to have sex with implying that I was the only such person."

"I feel strangely like... there's a part of me that wants that thing to be true of you, that you ask my permission, but I also feel reluctant to give you that order right this instant and I'm going to have to do an introspection to figure out why."

"Incidentally, even if I can't trust it, is there anything way simpler and more standard that male fourth-circle clerics do to not have kids."

Carissa Sevar: "Not that I know of. 

I wasn't - actually planning to go around sleeping with anyone else, knowing it bothers you, even though people here have really fantastic magic items. But I do keep a pretty sharp distinction, internally, between things I've agreed not to do and things I just definitely don't mean to, so if you want it to be the first thing we should talk about that."

Keltham: "Super valid," Keltham says.

Not knowing any male contraception solutions for clerics seems so incredibly odd, to the point of being Suspicious.  Do male fourth-circle clerics who don't want kids just... not have intercourse ever, except with expensive second-circle wizard sex workers?  Who, going on earlier things Carissa has said, maybe don't exist in the first place?  Do female fourth-circle clerics just not have intercourse period?  Though it does match up with an earlier statement to him that YES PLEASE CHELIAX WOULD LIKE SOME CONTRACEPTION TECHNOLOGY.  Or, for that matter, that they (*cough*theEroLARP*cough*) didn't assign him any clerics in his research harem.

"I - I'm not immediately sure of where this internal resistance is coming from.  Some of it is coming from a source that thinks I'm asking you to give me too much and will then owe you something too huge and yes I know you already noped me on that.  But that isn't making the feeling go away and I think it's loud enough to drown out some other feeling, which means I can't just go ahead and ignore the combined feeling, and -"

"Is this an urgent question, for any reason?"

Carissa Sevar: "No, it's not."

Keltham: Actually, there's an even simpler solution.  "Until tomorrow morning, I order you to not have sex with anyone without my permission.  Whatever it is my brain thinks is scary about this whole deal, it doesn't think that one day of it is scary the same way."

Carissa Sevar: "Understood. - and a good occasion for me to show you my other sex shop purchase." 

And she fishes it out of her Bag of Holding to explain.

Keltham: Keltham is - intrigued, but can tell that he doesn't quite - understand, deep in this part of him, the shape he's looking at -

"But I could just order you not to do that, right?  Is the magic item for - people whose partners, in a relationship like this one, don't trust them?  I can guess that's not it, but I'm confused."

Carissa Sevar: "That's not it - I mean, it's dispellable, so if I actually set my mind to getting around it I could. But some people enjoy the difference between 'impossible' and 'forbidden', like, you also don't need the chains because you could tell me to hold still, but if there are chains, then I'm not holding still because you told me to, anymore, I'm holding still because I can't move. Different flavor. ...also I think some people experience failures of will, about obeying an order like that for weeks or months, especially if you're messing with them around it enough, so maybe they actually do have to worry about breaking a rule even though they didn't mean to. I have never tried anything like this before so I shouldn't think too highly of myself but I think there's no order up to and including 'stick your hand in that fire and keep it there' I'd just disobey without warning you first that it was proving too difficult; if I would, then I'm just pretending, and I don't want to be just pretending."

Keltham: He has again that sense of being unnervingly close to some ledge, on which Carissa may be trying to stabilize him, or maybe push him off.  His mind retreats from the dangerous thing, tries to talk about something lesser and more trivial and safer: oh, is this anything like the thing some women do in Civilization, if they want to have a lot of sex available to trade for social capital, or collect a large harem, where they limit themselves to one actual orgasm per month, and otherwise stop short of that, to increase their sex drives?

He forces himself to face the scary thing instead; it doesn't pay to do that all day long, but he's had relatively few shocking revelations today.

"I don't know whether I'm more frightened-intrigued by the notion of you wanting to make it impossible to disobey orders, or the amount by which you're trying to hand me the total keys to your sexuality, but both of those things feel like they're a step too far for me to do this minute, and I need to let it sink in for an hour without forcing it -"

"My mind is imagining you struggling inside the chains and not being able to get out, though, and it thinks that's very sexy, much more sexy than just being chained up at all -"

"I'm sorry.  I need to hear you tell me that's okay, if and only if that actually is okay, obviously, I'm not asking you to send a false signal, but even after hearing you say it's fine to kill you, my brain still wants to hear you say whether or not it's okay that I'd see you struggling to get out of the chains and not let you out."

It really feels like this is a situation that demands the ability to talk in metalanguage and say 'dequote'; but Carissa keeps on seeming to reject, not so much that specific proposal, as the entire framework of thought that would want to hear about it.

Carissa Sevar: - okay, push the Keltham less. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to - rush you to the place you'll be when you're twenty-five. There's not actually any rush. It is definitely okay to be into me struggling in chains. It's - it is sexier, right, if the chains are actually doing something. And if I didn't happen to be into it, then I'd say 'it's a perfectly reasonable interest, I'm neutral on it' and you'd say 'reasoning with the mysterious Law Above The Other Law, one of the other girls will be into it', and that'd be all right too except for the part where it's very confusing. And if I happened to really dislike it then I'd tell you 'it is fine to be into that, but I dislike it'."

Keltham: "I'm frankly going to be more than slightly freaked out if I find that the girls in the harem exactly match up to every single one of my sexual desires with no leftovers.  It would say some pretty unsettling things about where I am and how I got there."

"Uh, the reasoning that would make me worry about that is definitely below the Law, to be clear.  It'd be above the gods, below the math.  What would it even mean to be above the Law, I can't coherently imagine that.  Nobody gets to decide that 1 + 2 = 4."

"I notice my brain being a little tired of relationshipping, and it occurs to me that we haven't eaten breakfast and should plausibly go eat lunch or whatever's on sale... or free, I guess, since I still haven't gotten around to having any local money.  I should ask if this Governance location can use a channeled healing at whatever standard rates are on that.  But, I mean, we can also wrap up if you had any big important dangling issues, I'm not saying we have to go eat right now."

It only occurs to Keltham after he speaks that he just offered Carissa options and asked her to make a decision instead of providing info to him.  Is that even wrong?  He doesn't know, but that section of his brain may be tired and need to rest, maybe.

Carissa Sevar: She seems unbothered. "Lunch sounds good. I doubt you can sell healing in the palace, even in wartime,  half the people here are clerics. Want me to go back to my room so you can have the afternoon to think?" Above the gods, not above Law. How could something be above the gods? It feels as absurd as deciding that 1 + 2 = 4. 

Keltham: "Not sure, I'll decide after lunch."  A thought occurs to him.  "Oh.  And, Carissa."

"Maybe I'll rethink this order later, but for now -"

"You don't ask to be let out of the chains.  You can struggle in the chains, but you can't say in words, 'let me out'.  I won't flip out if you slip up and say it once, but if you keep on saying it, you'll be disobeying me.  Same if I hurt you.  You can tell me it's painful, you can advise me that a more experienced sadist in my position would probably stop, but you don't tell me to stop or argue that I should stop.  If I'm doing something to you that's going to break your ability to obey that order, let me know when you see it coming.  Understood?"

Carissa Sevar: She is not sure where he’s going with that. But - “I understand.” And a smile, because she’s trying to reward steps in the right direction and that seems like one. 

Keltham: Keltham doesn't smile back.  One conceals feelings, perhaps, but showing a smile you don't mean is quite a step beyond that; it destroys the ability to signal later, because how can anything mean anything, after that.  "Good," is all he says.

Keltham isn't at all clear on his own ability to ignore somebody asking to be let out of chains.  He doesn't particularly want to test it while he's still such a novice.

And more importantly, if Carissa Sevar does start telling him that he needs to let her out right now, Keltham will know that something broke her will to obey him and that something is wrong with the entire setup.

Maybe it's cheating to set up a secret completely legible meta-signal of meta-level failure, but then -

- cheating is technique, after all.

"Then let's go eat lunch," Keltham says.

Iarwain: (They get all the way as far as halfway to a small eating hall before Keltham notices a lingering confusion - though to be clear, they do continue walking towards lunch past this point - and starts asking why a single use of Alter Self doesn't render women permanently sterile, if it destroys their limited supply of eggs that have no analogue uterus to carry them in male form; and why an implanted embryo would be destroyed by Alter Self if the eggs weren't destroyed; and why men aren't rendered sterile by Alter Self during the week (or whatever that duration was) that's required to mature new sperm if the current sperm maturing in the epididymis get destroyed; and actually maybe they should try this with food coloring, if that's a thing here, to see if that vanishes permanently from a vagina that temporarily doesn't exist; rather than having sex that's potentially a security-premise-violation, if the whole method proves not to work the very first time it's tested.)

(Good luck, Carissa Sevar!  A dath ilani woman in your position would know exactly how this masculine gendertrope works, but you don't!)

Pilar :       "I hate Chaotic Good," Aspexia Rugatonn says, her voice sounding reflective and her face as impassive as always.  She looks up from the papers in her hand, having just finished reviewing a transcript of Pilar's report on her involuntary tour of Elysium.  "I hate, hate, hate Chaotic Good.  If hatred were diamonds I could take my hatred of Chaotic Good and cast Miracle with it and have enough left over for a thousand Resurrections.  I would, personally, rather go to Abaddon than Elysium."

Pilar Pineda swallows.  "Grand High Priestess - is this one permitted to ask -"

      "Just speak your thoughts, Pineda.  I can hear them anyways."

"I was confused by the Chaotic Good outsider's claim that it served Asmodeus's interests for Cayden Cailean to do what He did to me.  I wonder if - if you think they're telling the truth, that I am not meant to be - harmful to our Lord -"

      "You don't conclude that I believe they were telling the truth, from the fact that you're still alive?"

No because the Grand High Priestess could be unsure and wanting to keep her options open, or because she could have some cunning counterplot of her own to whatever it is that Cayden Cailean is trying to do -

      "You are correct that I'm unsure," the Grand High Priestess answers her unspoken thought.  "But while Chaotic Good is not Lawful Good, under those circumstances and speaking to someone like you, it is unfortunately plausible that they would tell the truth."

Unfortunately? Pilar thinks, putting on hold her own relief if she really isn't being used against Asmodeus.

      "Yes, because now we are confused, as they no doubt intended, and our lives have become more complicated.  I rather doubt that, whatever larger plot is in play, that larger plot is meant to conduce to Asmodeus's interests.  If their plot is to destroy all Cheliax and then you are meant to prevent a new Worldwound from opening amid the ruins, that is not, on the whole, good news.  Though yes, even in that case, we would prefer there not be another Worldwound, so if some such apparent duty falls to you, perform it unless directed otherwise.  It is the job of such as myself to counterplot against Cayden Cailean's larger plan, not you."

Pilar nods her head.  She understands, or thinks she does.

      "This leaves us with the question of your behavior and performance during your trip to Elysium."  The Grand High Priestess regards Pilar more sternly, now.

Pilar isn't nearly as frightened as she should be, she knows, even though that's a bad thought.  She turned down Elysium for Asmodeus, and even if it's a wrong thought to think, still, that probably counts for something.

      "Oh, I see," says the Grand High Priestess of Asmodeus, her face impassive.  "You believe that you performed adequately?"

Is she still supposed to answer in words at all?  Probably, unless she's told not to, she's been asked a direct question.  "No mortal performs to Asmodeus's standards," Pilar answers.  "And all imperfections are worthy of punishment, if the slave is even worth that much time."  Pilar can't quite stop herself from thinking that, imperfect and flawed slave of Asmodeus as she may be, she's probably due for quite a lot less punishment than others would be in her position.  This thought is itself, of course, worthy of punishment.

      The face of the Grand High Priestess remains impassive.  "Do you know how specifically, you fell short?"

Pilar knows some parts that are obvious even to her.  "I was unable to justify myself clearly, when the Elysians asked me why I didn't want to stay - if I had been more trained in theology, I would have been able to -"

      "Chaotic Good outsiders cannot be persuaded into our Lord's embrace, and to justify yourself to them or argue with them, even taking our Lord's position, does not serve His interests in any way.  That you answered the Elysians at all is your failure, not that you answered incorrectly."

Pilar feels stupid.  "I understand."

      "What else?"

"The Elysians told me that if I stayed in Elysium, I would never again have to cast torture spells on children with no other uses in order to prove my loyalty, which they somehow knew I hadn't liked doing in the academy.  I could feel myself swaying to that, and when I felt that, I knew that after I came back, I would have to be retrained to do it better and without any hesitation.  For only a moment, then, I was tempted to stay."

      "Pity," says the Grand High Priestess.  "That significantly decreases your future usefulness.  I will make a note in your file that you are not to be tasked with such work unless there is strong reason."

Pilar doesn't know how to respond to that in words, at first, for being so surprised.  She would expect to be punished for her reluctance and corrected; for her to be exempted from unpleasant work instead is something that could be mistaken for mercy, and it is impossible that Aspexia Rugatonn would reason so.

      "There will be plenty of time to train out every last one of your flaws after you are received in Hell," the Grand High Priestess answers the unspoken thought.  "Meanwhile, in this world, your proven loyalty is potentially useful.  If that is a weak and vulnerable point in you, I will not have it strained without good cause and bring into question whether your loyalty remains as it was.  The more so, if the Elysians could potentially have planned to lure us into doing exactly that, after first giving us apparent reason to trust you."

Again Pilar feels stupid, but this is only natural when somebody who is not Aspexia Rugatonn is talking to somebody who is Aspexia Rugatonn.  The Elysians made her scared of something that, it turned out, was not in Asmodeus's interests to do to her.

      "What else?" says the Grand High Priestess.

Pilar swallows.  This part is worthy of severe punishment.  "I had the thought several times that - when they showed me Hell, and what that's like for people who aren't me - that, even if I didn't want to be in Elysium - maybe it would be better - if the people who wanted to be in Hell could be in Hell and the people who wanted to be in Elysium could be in Elysium."

      "You are correct, that is a thought worthy of severe punishment."

Pilar bows her head.

      "You may find it useful to contemplate, however, that the present nature of things is temporary.  In due time, everyone will go to Hell, and everyone will want to go to Hell."

That does make Pilar feel better, though she's surprised that she's getting any consolation at all when the thought is incorrect in the first place.

      "Because if you are so flawed as to have that thought, there is no point in allowing that thought even greater power over you by failing to consider what weighs against it on its own terms," answers the Grand High Priestess.  "Now, Pineda, answer me this.  Why am I the one consoling on you on this, instead of you taking these issues to someone in the priesthood or simply Security, whose time is far less valuable than mine?"

That's a good question and Pilar is unable to stop herself from thinking that maybe it's because, having proven her loyalty, she's now that valuable - no, that wouldn't make sense, it's Chaotic Good outsider exposure which only the Grand High Priestess is most competent to correct if it introduced any problems -

      "Wrong.  According to Security's initial interview with you, you thought of asking them for correction, but you had the thought that, if the Elysians were telling you the truth, maybe the Security officer was also somebody who'd take the chance to stay in Elysium if they believed they had that chance.  You were afraid that, if that was true, being corrected by Security would mean replacing your more correct thoughts with their less correct thoughts."

Pilar did also think (not that this defends her or lessens anything) that she didn't distrust them in general, it wasn't that she distrusted Security about Security, it was just, on the particular issue of being tempted to stay in Elysium, thinking incorrect thoughts when you're in Elysium, she couldn't trust them about that -

      "So the leader of Asmodeus's Church in Golarion had to personally take her valuable time to correct you, because, now, you would not have trusted almost anyone else.  Now that Chaotic Good outsiders have whispered to you that you are more truly loyal to Asmodeus and more correct in your thinking and more trustworthy than the senior wizards in security."

"Yes," Pilar whispers, feeling miserable.  The Elysians got to her after all.

      "Unfortunately, the Elysians told you the truth.  This being the case, your concern was simply correct.  Nearly all wizards in Security and indeed even most priests of Asmodeus have not proven themselves able to meet the test of true loyalty that you passed.  They are not authorized to correct your thoughts about Elysium or who is most loyal to Asmodeus.  Only myself or those I designate are authorized to so correct you."

      "That said, to state your self-humbling thought more precisely, great loyalty is often not the quality most critical to a commander.  One usually wishes for great competence foremost, accompanied by whatever level of loyalty seems adequate and with some safety margin.  If on some rare occasion the quality we needed in a commander was the greatest possible loyalty, and this was more important than your lack of experience and knowledge and power and your many other failings, perhaps then you would be placed in command.  Nor should you mistake the possibility that your superiors are less loyal than you, for your own certain knowledge of that fact.  Understand?"

"Yes," Pilar answers.

      "Good.  After this, you will report to the temple torture chamber and assign yourself whatever degree of punishment you feel is appropriate for your failures in Elysium."

To say that Pilar is surprised would be an understatement indeed.  She will obey, of course, but - she doesn't understand, is this a test, to see if she'll assign herself too little punishment, or if she'll assign herself extra to prove her loyalty -

      "You are done with tests of that kind," the Grand High Priestess answers.  "You have passed the strongest version of that test which anyone could face.  You know your own history in more detail than I do, my time is valuable, and I cannot be bothered to interview you on specifics and evaluate them.  You do it.  Just assign yourself whatever tortures seem standard and appropriate for your failures.  If you desire any more punishment than that for reasons of faith, do it on your own recognizance."

Because you are trusted, now.

No, Pilar must only be imagining that this could be the subtext, here, she is not - not that worthy, she is only a second-circle wizard -

Pilar rises and turns to go.

      "Pilar," Aspexia Rugatonn says, before Pilar has reached the door.  Her voice is, if not gentle, unusually not-harsh.  "Pride is one of our Lord's domains.  As you should not be mistaken about who is above you, you should also not be mistaken about who is lower.  Speak to me the thought you are not letting yourself think."

Pilar turns back.

She takes a deep breath.

"Grand High Priestess," Pilar says, "if you had to lead an army of adventurers into Elysium, and anyone who followed you would have a choice to stay in Elysium, how many - how many could you find to take with you?"

      "Eleven."

Eleven!? Pilar thinks in dismay and even horror, though she does not, of course, question the Grand High Priestess out loud.  Eleven, in all of Cheliax?

      "Oh, I am sure there are many more than eleven in Cheliax who would make the choice you did to leave Elysium behind.  Our service to our Lord would be pathetic indeed, if all the Church's work in Cheliax these last eighty years had produced no more than eleven souls truly loyal to Him.  The trouble is, you see, Pilar, that Asmodeans do lie to themselves, about what choice they would make there, and though this lie is also pleasing to our Lord, it is still, in the end, a lie.  They would not know their disloyalty even to themselves, and Detect Thoughts would not suffice to root them out.  The Chaotic Good outsider who spoke to you was also truthful about that aspect of things."

      "We punish people whose disloyalty rises to the level of thoughts that we can see, that they can know to themselves; and while that does to some extent serve to train away disloyal thinking, sometimes it only trains away the visibility.  In Cheliax, where they know their thoughts will be read again in time, that serves well enough; when there is a certainty of Hell in time, it serves well enough.  Faced with Elysium, those thoughts might suddenly resurface."

      "There are many more in Cheliax who would refuse Elysium, of that I am sure.  There are eleven of whom I know.  Eleven of whom I am certain."

      "Well.  Twelve, now."

Pilar Pineda feels prouder in that moment than she has in her entire life.

      "There is no reward for a job well done in Cheliax," says Aspexia Rugatonn.  "Only a diminishing of punishments for failure.  This does not mean that a job done well never benefits you, Pilar.  Only that, if so, the benefit is incidental to how it serves our Lord's interests.  You have proven yourself as few of our Lord's followers ever prove themselves, and if you were not already assigned to one of the most important projects in Cheliax, you soon would be."

      "Go with Asmodeus, Pilar Pineda.  You have done as well as mortals ever do."

"Thank you!  You've been so super helpful to me, actually, do you want a cookie?"

...

Pilar turns and hurls the sourceless cookie at the wall as hard as she can.  Under other circumstances she would scream.  This was literally the finest moment she will ever have in her life, and Cayden fucking Cailean just ruined it for her.

      "Only if you let Him ruin it," Aspexia Rugatonn says, though the harshness is back in her voice.  "I genuinely hope we can find something to do about your problem."

Pilar departs.  She is reminded of the fact that Aspexia Rugatonn's time is indeed valuable, and how much of it just got spent on her, when she sees the line of important people who were waiting outside for her to finish.

The next person in that line, robed as a third-circle priest, darts inside and slams two pieces of paper on Rugatonn's desk and begins some rapid hushed report without waiting for the door to shut.  The door hasn't closed and sealed away the sounds within, in fact, when Pilar on her way out hears the Grand High Priestess's voice rising to almost a shriek, "He what?"

Somebody is about to have a very bad day, and Pilar is glad it's not her.

She skips her way along towards the temple's torture chamber, for almost ten full steps, before she realizes that she is fucking skipping through the halls and manages to fucking stop it.

lintamande: At first it's not obvious to the remaining student body of the Secret Project what exactly they're supposed to do with themselves; Carissa's orders, when she briefly walked past them while retrieving her possessions to leave with Keltham for the imperial palace, were 'learn about Taldor'. But it doesn't take them all that long to find their feet; obviously no one's going to come walk them through everything like they're children. 

Security has swept the villa for things left behind by Kuthites, found a couple of old chambers that were perfectly sealed up with old skeletons inside, which isn't very interesting, and reorganized all the bedrooms so as to make the place defensible if the project returns here, though it might not. There are devils openly patrolling the grounds, now, each of them bound within their ten-foot circles (it's the cheapest way to get devils). They can't fight much like that, obviously, but they'll notice it. And unlike human security they don't complain about the by-now-fairly-torrential rain. 

And the whole mess is a good excuse to completely reformulate the library to be in line with the project. Paxti requests permission to go with Security to Absalom book-shopping, and when that doesn't work Yaisa tries seducing Elias for the same privilege (he sleeps with her but does not take her to Absalom, which is a valuable life lesson). But there's sorting through all the existing books for consistency with the new paradigm, and making fun of the old Taldane romance novels, and while Security's using all their Teleports for war-related travel they do go out to Ostenso's bookshops and find some books published in Taldor or in pre-Hell Cheliax they can work with. 

By the afternoon of the day after the attack this effort is in full swing; they have books in piles on the floor, and are reading through them and chattering about them and sorting them and Mending them as needed. They have a plan for if Keltham shows up unexpectedly, they're going to claim there was water damage to the books, since a bunch of windows broke in the fight and it's been raining so hard since then. (So that this isn't a lie, they're causing some water damage to the books.)

Ione Sala: Ione wakes up with her head feeling like a watermelon that has fallen off a four-story building.  And had its watermelon soul go to watermelon Abaddon and be hunted down by things that eat watermelon souls, things with white eyes and bony hands.

Everything seems dreamlike and her thoughts are like she's halfway through falling asleep, thoughts that don't follow from other thoughts, and therefore she needs to say, as her first words when she wakes:

"Stop damaging books takaral!  This is a library takaral!"

Keltham: "- turn every laundry wizard into somebody who can apply one-week male contraception, if that plan works.  And the first thing we need to get started on that is a couple of hundred mice.  Well, no, the first thing we need to get started is... a few gallons of vinegar - good, that translated - and whatever you've got that makes vinegar foam up when you add it to vinegar.  But that might not work unless either you or I can get a magnet field stabilized."

Carissa Sevar: Carissa isn't sure this is Cheliax's most important priority at all but it's - surprisingly nice, actually, just collaborating on a research project instead of trying to seduce Keltham into evil. "Summoned mice or real mice - actually, usually wizards use summoned mice for experiments but here in a Forbiddance it'll be less complicated to get real ones. What things have magnetic fields, it might be easier to manipulate one that already exists and it'd give me a feel for what I'm manipulating -"

Keltham: "Well, magnets, most obviously, but if you hand me any piece of metal that could be magnetized, like iron or steel, I can use Prestidigitation to induce a magnet field in that, and then maybe you can see if that's just as easy for you or if it's somehow taking advantage of my knowledge of the Law of magnets.  Prestidigitation can't produce acids, according to you, but according to my best guess as to what Prestidigitation does, it should definitely be able to shift acidity, and that may have to do with my knowledge of what acidity is rather than it being a mystical property of liquids to destroy things."

"And definitely real mice, unless summoned mice can get pregnant, the whole point is to see what works to stop mouse pregnancies.  We'll also need an expert on mouse anatomy to help me trace out where the mouse analogue to the human male epididymis is, and now that I think about it, that could easily require the ability - make images bigger, so you can examine them better.  And also for mice we need to focus down the Prestidigitation even smaller than it would have to go in humans, which brings up the question of how good magic is at focusing forces down to tiny targets - including via spellsilver-stabilized magic items if that helps."

Carissa Sevar: "Most of the time whether you can do detail work or not is just a matter of talent, the limit you run into is your own ability to manipulate the magic rather than anything inherent about its behavior at small scales. I don't know if that would be true if you were doing something wildly outside the range of things people try to do but mouse surgery is in the range of things people try to do, I'd expect. We have invented the microscope. Summoned animals aren't around long enough to get pregnant.

What....is acidity."

Keltham: "It's what lemons, vinegar, and stronger liquids that can dissolve metal if you know those, all have in common, and presumably it's what the Acid Splash cantrip - well, fakes, or so I'd guess.  Describing it in terms of underlying Law would be a detour, but also it's bad news if we have to take that detour because that makes it much harder to teach laundry wizards to do it."

Carissa Sevar: She knew that and wanted the underlying Law but she doesn't argue. "I wouldn't expect that - I don't have to know what chocolate underlyingly is in order to make Prestidigitation taste like it. Iron, steel, magnet, mice, vinegar, things that bubble mixed with vinegar, just checking, am I interfacing with Acquisitions for you because it takes time or because you expect some weird cultural misunderstanding or because you don't like it or because it didn't occur to you you can interface with them yourself -"

Keltham: "Marta was, I think, if I'm not misidentifying the pieces, lying in two separate and importantly distinct places in one of the hallways.  I'm not sure if she's considered high-priority for resurrection.  Not really sure of who Acquisitions is right now, or if there is one before the project has some sort of official restart point."

"But actually it's more that - we don't just need the mice, we need a place to keep mice for a few weeks while we watch them to see if they're pregnant, and I don't know what that lab equipment looks like in Golarion.  I can go to Acquisitions myself if I know who that is, I guess, but then it feels like I might accidentally get, like, just two hundred mice in a giant bag.  I sometimes get the impression that people here, who are not you, may not really expect my plans to make sense; or, rather, they're not surprised if it only makes sense to me and not to them.  Which is how you end up with a giant bag of mice and no mouse food.  So, my theory is that first I explain to you what I need and what it's for, and you ask me questions until you're confident you've understood, and then you actually say it to Acquisitions."

Carissa Sevar: "At one point I asked Security, look, this is really important, I haven't got any training in it, do we want to now that we're convinced it's for real replace us with a real research team, and he said, uh, they'd showed the transcripts of the lectures to other people but it doesn't seem to produce the same result. The - expecting that your plans make actual Lawful sense and I can figure out why too." 

Keltham: "If it was that easy the Watchers wouldn't have made us play elaborate games and figure things out on our own, would they, when they could've just put us somewhere sunny and let us read books about other people figuring things out."

"That's why I'm worried about Asmodia trying to catch up after being gone for a week.  I'm worried it won't be as easy as her just reading the transcripts."

"Oh, actually, though - before we move forwards on this, I should write a note to Lrilatha asking her if she thinks it's actually a good idea for laundry wizards to be able to apply male birth control, that's something that affects heritage optimization over all of Golarion.  Have you got writing stuff in your hammerspace by any chance?"

Carissa Sevar: "Yes, that's a good thing to ask her - if it causes birth rates to crash among all the smart people and all the people living in areas that've managed to make magic accessible and cheap -" She fishes out a pen and paper. "She's probably incredibly busy, what with the war, so I'd just write a short note and indicate what you'll do if you don't hear back -"

Keltham: "Does it cost her nothing to read Baseline, or should I write in Taldane?"

Carissa Sevar: "She probably has permanent Tongues, it's only as expensive as a good headband, but I don't specifically know for sure she has it."

Keltham: Keltham writes down in Taldane:

From: Keltham

Hypothetical project transforming:input: 1 cast Prestidigitation -> output: male sterility lasting ~1 weekUnsure if expected good/bad effects on Cheliax/GolarionExample obvious goods:- Contraception available not just to wizards, so not relatively selecting against wizards as much- Regions able to deliberately enter equilibrium of having more resources per child, not more children than resources, leading to possibly higher Intelligence per child- Regions more able to employ conscious heritage-optimization over themselves, fewer accidental children, more deliberate onesExample obvious bad:- Possible relative birth rate crash among whoever can afford Prestidigitation / live in a city

Good idea to proceed?  y/nValue to Cheliax if successful?   #Person to ask instead of you?

He then folds it and writes on the outside -

"What was her job title again?"

After being answered:

Viewable only by:  Contessa Lrilatha

lintamande: Shortly after, there's a knock at the door. 

Keltham: "Enter," calls Keltham, unaware of any update this might be producing in Carissa.

lintamande: It's the Imperial envoy who brought them to the palace, and a serious-looking, dignified, middle-aged noblewoman behind him. 

"Announcing the Paracountess Isidre Astrid Asgavan Thrune, here to see Keltham," the envoy says.

Iarwain: "If you have a moment, that is," Isidre Thrune says pleasantly, then looks more serious.  "Or realistically, more like half an hour.  Is this a good time?"

Keltham: Does lots of names indicate importance?  Keltham remembers mention of very powerful wizards having unreasonably long names.  Oh, and that sure is a big fancy-looking headband she's wearing.

"Works for me if it works for Carissa."

Iarwain: "I am afraid I was hoping to speak to you alone," Isidre Thrune says, half-inclining her head in an apologetic gesture.

Keltham: Keltham feels vaguely like he's supposed to check with Carissa about this but has managed to pick up the rhyme if not the reason of some Chelish interactions, and does have the ill-formed sense, now, that he's not supposed to ask Carissa's okay to say yes to this.

"All right," Keltham says.

Then he runs a quick Detect Magic to see if he spots anything weird about the envoy, for that small further chunk of probability in case this is a Kuthite plot.  Okay, Keltham thinks that looks like the Arcane Mark of the person who ran a bunch of spells on him last night.

Carissa Sevar: Carissa curties and steps back. 

(From Maillol's reaction she was not expecting they'd be able to get the eighth circle wizard needed for this conversation in today; she's pleasantly surprised.)

Iarwain: The envoy accepts a note for Lrilatha from Keltham.

Isidre Thrune escorts Keltham to a nearby interview room, sumptuously appointed (but not in doompunk), with no external windows.  They will be seated across from one another in luxurious padded chairs (still monstrosities of ergonomics by dath ilani standards), between them an intricately carved round table bearing a variety of exotic snacks and fluted beverages.

Iarwain: The envoy, after the two go, informs Sevar that they are to follow soon and silently behind.  Sevar will watch this interview through a one-way wall, so that a nearby spellcaster running Detect Thoughts can keep half an eye on Sevar's own thoughts, in case she wants to loudly think anything important.  If so, the information will make its way to Isidre Thrune, who has one of the highest Splendours that could be found on this much notice.

Also Maillol is temporarily unavailable for a while and Sevar is back in charge for something like the next half-day.

Carissa Sevar: - Carissa is confused, but right now she should probably focus on this conversation which is fairly high stakes and poke that confusion later. Here, while she's at it, is a shopping list for Keltham should Lrilatha approve his project.

Keltham: "May I inquire what this is about?" Keltham says in his best Very Serious mode.

Iarwain: Isidre Thrune nods.  "I am, as you may have surmised from the headband, one of the highest boosted-Intelligence individuals in all Cheliax, and one of those who have been reviewing events on your project from here in the palace.  I begin by offering you the following piece of good news:  Ione Sala has awakened, and, though she is not quite returned to normal, the fact that she awakened at all is good news about her prospects of eventual recovery."

Keltham: One of the very smart people who are smarter than the other people, check.  It's sort of good to know they actually exist at all, and are optimizing stuff in Governance here at all.

"Sounds like apparently good news," Keltham replies.  "Though - did she seem like herself, at all?  Like, definitely Ione but afteraffects, or more like, didn't return to anything like being Ione yet?"

If they don't know about the Nethys thing, he doesn't want to mention it yet, at least, not if she otherwise recovers anyways; but he's still concerned about whether it's Nethys in there now, or Ione.

Iarwain: Isidre inclines her head.  "The former, I would say, though I'm going on the reactions of those around Ione Sala, rather than having very much acquaintance with her myself.  Did you expect otherwise?"

Keltham: "I am not clear on what to expect from - forcible human-god interactions."

Iarwain: "Mm."  Isidre briefly sips from one of the fluted thin glasses laid out on her side of the table.  "Or perhaps you have a guess you arrived at by stranger means.  Pilar Pineda, I hope you've by now heard, has been resurrected after surprisingly having been located in Elysium, the Chaotic Good afterlife.  After reviewing a recent report from Sevar, on a hunch, I ordered a check on whether Pineda had a fetish for, as Sevar somewhat politely put it to you, 'being forced', though we would usually simply call it a rape fetish."

"Pilar does.  In fact it is what we'd term an obligate fetish, meaning that she has not much interest in sex without it."

"This is not at all surprising to us, however rare such a thing may be in dath ilan; here it is among the most common fetishes.  The fact remains that you may have been said to have somehow known it.  Apparently by similar and mysterious lines of reasoning that led you to worry about a hidden cleric of Zon-Kuthon, maybe even unknown to herself, among the student wizards you've been assigned."

"Sevar's report says that she asked, and you said it was too complicated.  I am wondering if you'd be willing to try explaining to somebody with higher Intelligence."

Carissa Sevar: This random noblewoman is not, actually, going to be able to parse the explanation whatever it is, and possibly Carissa should consider the person casting Detect Thoughts to be likelier to get it than Carissa but - she's not sure she does expect that. They almost certainly haven't actually patiently read all the project logs. There aren't that many people cleared to do that and there's quite a lot of project logs and a war on. If Maillol (he has to be in trouble, that's the only reason they'd know how long he'll be indisposed) didn't know in advance who'd be able to do this then there isn't a wizard that powerful who's up to date on the whole thing.

So if Keltham does decide to explain it to Isidre then she's the one who'll have to figure out what Isidre should say. 

She casts Fox's Cunning on herself, just in case.

Keltham: If the word 'rape' is translating at all correctly, Keltham is having some trouble seeing how the notion of a 'rape fetish' isn't as obviously paradoxical as 'asking somebody to rape you'; but presumably there's some elided meta/object distinction that makes sense of it, and in any case that's not the most urgent topic right now.

So.  Pilar has the fetish.  But it's very common locally, maybe it's 1/3 of the population, say, if he'd also checked Ione then taking the universe at face value there'd be a 55% probability of at least one of the two having the fetish.  But still, it should probably be called something like one bit of evidence favoring the eroLARP hypothesis.

"I wasn't saying Sevar was too stupid for it," Keltham replies after taking a moment to think.  "I was saying the concept structure came at the end of a long series of other concepts, that would take too long to explain.  Higher Intelligence doesn't let you bypass that sequence, what would be needed is that you have a lot of prerequisites that I'd guess to be outright unknown in Golarion."

There's also the concern about whether explaining the notion of an eroLARP to people inside the eroLARP will drive them insane or cause this universe to collapse.  But if Carissa is able to hear him talking about his weird theories and the very smart people immediately investigate them in Pilar and report back to him, it doesn't seem like that kind of eroLARP; they're apparently allowed to know.  Anyways, though it seems kind of foolish in retrospect, he already published that private key.

Abrogail Thrune II: WHAT.

Cause the universe to collapse, WHAT.

Abrogail Thrune II: What the ABYSS is an 'eroLARP'.

Abrogail Thrune II: Many thoughts Keltham thinks have pieces that are completely opaque to Abrogail Thrune because they refer to concepts that Abrogail Thrune simply doesn't have.  Like 'private-key' or 'one bit of evidence' or, unfortunately, 'eroLARP'.  It parses to her essentially as 'private-~~~', '1 ~~~ of evidence', and in the most important part 'sex~~~~'. 

Iarwain: "Is there perhaps some metaphor you could use to explain?" says Isidre Thrune.

Keltham: Metaphor, huh.  "Maybe something like - pattern recognition?  I'm not working off a fundamental Law that reduces to simple math like the things I've been lecturing on.  More like, I'm recognizing pieces of the universe that match part of a pattern I know about, and guessing about how the rest might get filled in.  Like - actually I don't know if you have fictional novels here, there weren't any in the archduke's library.  Do you have, like, untrue but popular stories about, I don't know, some girl who wants to rule her own planet when she grows up, and then she's abducted by aliens with lots of problems and has to solve those problems to become ruler of their planet?  I mean, those wouldn't be your stories, but I wouldn't know what Golarion stories are about."

Iarwain: "We have novels, certainly," Isidre replies.  "Though in Cheliax most of the novels we have on hand predate the recent ascent of the Asmodean Church here, and are somewhat appallingly written; we have not considered it the best use of Cheliax's sharply limited resources to make better ones exist, just yet.  An example of the sort of thing that might be in one of those novels - maybe a boy finding a magic sword, falling in love with a beautiful princess, using the magic sword to slay a dragon, and presenting the dragon's death to the princess's father to win her hand in marriage.  I admit, I have not read many of those myself."

Carissa Sevar: (Carissa is pleasantly surprised - the answer suggests someone in the loop in fact has read all of the conversation transcripts, and maybe a bit of the Taldane books besides.)

Keltham: 'Certainly', huh, Keltham's sort of disappointed, he was hoping a Very Smart Person here would know better than to talk with the probability-1 declarations sprinkled all over the crazy books here.  He guesses that's a matter of Law more than Intelligence.

"Then if someone has read a number of stories like that, if they got to the point where the boy falls in love with a high-status woman, after having earlier obtained a magic sword, they could guess the boy was going to do something with the magic sword to impress the high-status woman."

Iarwain: "I see, or think I see.  But - where are you getting the patterns that you're using to determine that Pilar has a rape fetish or that one of the girls is a Kuthite sleeper operative?"

Keltham: From reading his friends' fanfictions about a currently-superpopular novel deconstructing eroLARPs; eroLARPs that, by comparison, almost nobody must have actually played, compared to how many people found out about them by reading some of their friends' fanfictions so they wouldn't be left out of discussions about it.  But that's not really what she's asking, anyways.

Now, how to reply without panicking her over the idea that her universe might be fictional?  Which isn't even actually the idea here; but if you don't know about computer simulations, and the generalized notion of laws of physics that let you imagine alternate such laws, and equivalence classes of causal structures embedded in other structures, and realityfluids generalizing quantum amplitudes, what do you even say that the smart-but-ignorant Golarion native doesn't just parse down to 'possibly we're all just a generalized illusion or maybe trapped in some sort of book, sure go panic now'.

"I'm not really sure how to say it, except that the patterns are in my memories out of dath ilan, and their origin in dath ilan was complicated," Keltham replies.  "I would not have particularly expected to find facts and events here, corresponding to those memories.  And a lot of things don't correspond in that way, to be clear, I'd have been much less confused, getting here, if this world was even 5% made out of things I was expecting to see.  But there's bits and pieces of this world, all over, that fit into one pattern or another.  And the danger is that I'm just looking up at random clouds, and seeing faces, trees, patterns in the sky that are pure coincidence.  As you say, if the fetish is very common here, then Pilar having it isn't much evidence."

Now, how to reply without panicking her over the idea that her universe might be fictional?  Which isn't even actually the idea here; but if you don't know about ~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~, and the generalized notion of ~~~~ of ~~~~~~~ that let you imagine alternate such ~~~~, and ~~~~~~ ~~~~~~ of ~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~ embedded in other ~~~~~~~, and ~~~~~~ generalizing ~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~, what do you even say that the smart-but-ignorant Golarion native doesn't just parse down to 'possibly we're all just a generalized illusion or maybe trapped in some sort of book, sure go panic now'.

This is the most disturbing Detect Thoughts that Abrogail has ever cast.

Is Sevar thinking anything helpful?

Carissa Sevar: If you're a boy with a sword, you'd be an idiot to conclude you're in a story where you slay a dragon and marry the princess; there are lots of boys with swords, and almost none of them pull it off. You can just look up the odds.

If you're a boy from another world, who has already started a war between Asmodeus and Zon-Kuthon....

What would it even mean to be in a story where you change the world, as distinct from being in a world where you change the world?

The only thing that comes to mind that feels at all Keltham shaped is that it's an answer to what put you there. If Asmodeus copied Keltham into the world to explain Law, then the girls are - not exactly a side point, they're supposed to seduce him to Evil after all, but they're not a source of - if Asmodeus copied Keltham there then you wouldn't expect one of the girls to be a Kuthite spy, because the process that produced the girls wouldn't have any interest in that, and most random Chelish wizarding students are not Kuthite spies. 

If Keltham ended up here because - she has no idea how to finish the thought but it's at least a question -

Ask him, is this in part a hypothesis about what process caused you to arrive here instead of nowhere or instead of somewhere that was systematically catching dead people -

Iarwain: "Is all this - tangled up with theories you have of how you came to be here, instead of nowhere?  Or instead of somewhere that was catching dead people from your world more systematically than Golarion seems to?"

Keltham: All right, that's slightly impressive, maybe the bigger headbands are actually good for anything.

"It would have to be, yeah, but I don't exactly have a lot of specifics and what specifics I have... aren't something I'm thinking of a good metaphor for... let me think."  Sure, if you've got enough prerequisites, it's obvious in retrospect that the explanation for what happened to Keltham is that almost all of the copies of him ended, across the multiverse of everything being infinitely embedded all over the multiverse, and this is one of the Kelthams that didn't end, in some universe that's either higher-complexity than his original universe or of course a higher-complexity specific embedded somewhere simpler than that, and then, arguendo, if the EroLARP Hypothesis is correct, he was localized to somewhere such that it has convenient evolutionarily-implausible 'masochists' who are super okay with not being let out of their chains when they struggle, so that hurting them during sex, which it turned out you really wanted to do, doesn't get you kicked out of that city or exiled to the Last Resort.

Keltham has not figured out why this would be the case, but he doesn't need a specific hypothesis of why to notice what it looks like and start generating predictions.

And then, of course, you have the problem of explaining this to a Golarion native who has no idea that her own world sure looks like it runs on quantum mechanics the same as dath ilan, and how that means there's an exponentially vast number of near-exact copies of her spread all over the local amplitudes to say nothing of the alternate laws of physics that embed each other as substructures.

Does Taldane contain the word 'fanfiction'?  No it does not.  Well, there goes that metaphor for 'this world is a continuation fic of my life because in an infinite multiverse containing an infinite number of fanfiction writers no book can ever truly end', which, on reflection, would probably have been an overly disturbing thing to try to explain anyways.

Abrogail Thrune II: There are how many of her all over the place?  Where and what are they even doing, does dath ilan actually know all this or are they just making it up.

Iarwain: "Are you thinking possibly that you are in - not one of the Outer Planes that we think of as an afterlife - but rather that this entire greater universe is your afterlife?" ventures Isidre Thrune.  It doesn't seem to be what Keltham is thinking, but maybe he'll explain why it's not.

Keltham: That gets Keltham to smile, briefly.  "Well, this universe rather counts as my afterlife by definition, what with my life having ended, and this being after it.  I don't really have the concept of your afterlives down yet, though.  So whatever further connotations you were thinking of importing from the standard terminology, I can't say anything about those."

Abrogail Thrune II: Is Sevar possibly thinking anything useful right now.

Carissa Sevar: No, no, that's not it, not that she knows what it is, but she wouldn't have asked that question and she's not thinking how to - she cannot wait to read the thought transcript that'll presumably make this all make perfect sense -

Iarwain: "Are you thinking that this world was in some way created just for you," Isidre says.  "Maybe that - you're the only real person here?"

Abrogail Thrune II: She has not lost sight of Cheliax's goals; if Keltham thinks that, he will be much easier to turn to Evil.

Keltham: "I'd have to be pretty search-blind not to think of that possibility at all, but I rather doubt it; anybody who put me in a fake world with a Carissa who isn't real and has no internal experiences is not at all doing me a favor, by that, and why make a whole world for somebody if you're not doing them a favor?  I can tap myself with a truthspell and repeat that, if your version of Governance wants assurance that I'm unlikely to strangle all my students after deciding they're not real."