"A relatively trivial matter first.  Authorize this message to Keltham, deny it, or correct it.  It is my own best estimate that this event would occur in the alter-Cheliax we are constructing, but the effects on Keltham are not easy for me to guess, nor whether those serve us."

Rugatonn takes a paper memo from her desk and hands it over.

Dear Keltham:

As you may perhaps have already realized by now, your etiquette instructor did not give you wordings meant to preserve the Queen's pride, but to make you look as gloriously dominant as possible in front of Carissa Sevar.  That occurred via my own intervention.  Some of this, I admit, is an old woman's humorous meddling in young love.  I would not have done it even so, did I not think it serve Cheliax better, that Sevar love you a little more, than that the Queen's pride be a little more preserved.

I was not aware at the time of your agreement with the Queen to owe her an informal favor about her lost pride.  I have informed the Queen that any such favor should be considered to be partially owed by myself, rather than you, to the extent she lost any more pride than she otherwise would have done, in that particular moment.  My apologies for that element of it, if not others.

Have fun with your adoring new possession.  The first one only happens once.

-- Aspexia Rugatonn, Grand High Priestess of Asmodeus, called also 'Aspie' among her friends.

Carissa reads through it somewhat incredulously. Gives herself a moment to think. Keltham will probably be incredibly confused, but he's already treating etiquette as a fairly absurd social game, and he's not wrong to.  She...thinks he'll just buy that the Grand High Priestess was meddling out of appreciation for young love, and it'll fit his impression of senior Chelish leadership as excessively Good people with excessively powerful headbands, which - is convenient until cracks start showing... and possibly safer to attribute to Isidre than to the Grand High Priestess. 

"I don't think he did realize at all," she says. "I think this succeeds at getting him to categorize you, mentally, with Isidre, rather than with Contessa Lrilatha, and I'm unsure which of those categorizations I prefer and might like keeping the option value open."

"Are you able to mostly prevent my opinions from unduly influencing yours, if I share them further?  It seems best that final policy be routed through one person, that her policy be a coherent whole.  That person cannot be myself."

"Yes, Most High. I'll weight your opinions highly but knowing that my actual job here is to succeed with Keltham and that I might have insights I can't convey."

"I doubt Keltham will categorize myself with Lrilatha no matter what.  He considers Lawful beings to be a species apart within Golarion.  He is correct, and this is a true and deep fact about Golarion, and all else he sees will tend to accord with it.  Without constantly referring to a devil's advice, I would not be able to pretend to be like Lrilatha to Keltham."

"My primary concern generating this note was that Keltham will realize later that his etiquette instruction was off, and then will wonder why this event, which should have occurred in alter-Cheliax, did not occur in his reality."

"The final decision is yours, and does not need to be taken immediately - at least, not in my own estimation.  Aspie could plausibly find out about Keltham's prior bargain with Abrogail at any time over the next few days."

"If the true consequences of my act inside alter-Cheliax, as they would impinge on Keltham, are less beneficial to our purposes than I believed, then I have made a mistake.  Not for any wise and excellent reason, either, but as part of a game with Abrogail, and an indulgence however much pent-up.  I tell you this so that you understand, and it is a very important understanding, that Aspexia Rugatonn is not only theoretically capable of error but actually commits those on a daily basis.  Do not assume her infallible any more than you would assume Hell or Asmodeus to be infallible."

- it is strange to have someone assert as if it's a routine fact about the world that Asmodeus is fallible. Even though once she chases the thought down - yes, obviously, Asmodeus isn't omniscient - and she has no idea whether He ever makes mistakes given what he knows but the important thing from the perspective of his servants is that He might not intend the effects of things He does, or might be missing key information -

- right, okay -

- she's absolutely not going to have opinions on the game played between the Grand High Priestess and Abrogail. Some things she does not need opinions about. 

"Yes, Most High," she says. "I think it should be sent tomorrow afternoon, and will countermand that if I change my mind, which I might."

"If you're saying that to give yourself a measured time to think, I will send it in two days unless I hear otherwise from you by then.  You have not realized how much busier you are than you think yourself to be."

"That particular move in the throne room is one I'd almost never play, even if I was making an indulgent move against Abrogail, if circumstances had become less strange than they have now become.  Under circumstances less strange than these, I would be very unlikely to do something because it was cruelly funny, in a situation otherwise of interest to Asmodeus.  Cruel in other ways, certainly, but not cruelly funny.  Has your mastery of Keltham's teachings of Law reached the point where you can already guess why?"

"I don't think so." And she haaaaaaaates not passing tests, but better to know what she doesn't know.

"Asmodeus knows what mortal humor is.  Asmodeus has seen many, many cases of mortal humor.  It is still relatively harder for Him to predict.  Humor is one of the things that mortals do which is least like anything done by gods who were never mortal, and there is too wide a variety of ways for something to seem surprising and funny to a mortal bent on that."

"The most fundamental fact about all of our lives as Asmodeus's servants, now, is that we are living in a world of shattered prophecy.  It now actually matters to our Lord whether we are being cruelly humorous or just cruel at key moments."

"So the thing you did in the throne room is costlier for Him to anticipate than everybody staying in line and doing what they're ordered to do."

"The entire affair in the throne room was already so far beyond Asmodeus's plausible ability to have predicted, or at least, predicted using only His own powers, that it didn't matter at that point whether I started being funny."

"In a closely related matter, the Queen has noted to me that you are, as they say in the lands beyond our Lord's correction, 'in love' with Keltham.  As she told you that she would, the Queen referred your correction, if any, to myself.  How would you go about deciding whether or not to do anything about that, were you the Grand High Priestess?"

Oh, she knows the answer to this one! "Asmodeus said not to be proactive in my correction beyond the ordinary course of Asmodeus's Law. It's obviously not ordinary to correct people for having stupid feelings; it's self-correcting, really, under ordinary circumstances. I don't know if it's ordinary to correct people who are on important espionage missions who develop feelings about their targets, but whatever's ordinary, I'd do that, were I the Grand High Priestess."

"Somebody on an ordinary important espionage mission would certainly be corrected in that.  By advice and warning while they were on their mission, if perhaps it was not both possible and prudent to send them to a torture chamber just then.  By more severe correction upon their return, assuming their souls sufficiently bought that this would not disincentivize their return."

"By the time we get to you and Keltham, we are so far outside the ordinary that there simply isn't any answer by reference to what we usually do.  There is still a clear meaning of 'ordinary' Law, however, in that case; it means then, not to do what we usually do, but to do what we'd have done without a message from Hell singling out Carissa Sevar."

"Even absent that message, however, Carissa Sevar ends up in this office hearing essentially what I am telling you now, only except without any parts about a message from Hell to be ignored.  Which is why we are having this conversation in the first place."

"This other Carissa Sevar is then asked to say what she would do about Carissa Sevar's love for Keltham if she were the Grand High Priestess."

"Obviously it would be good for my soul to be corrected, as severely as necessary for it to actually stick this time. I...suspect it would not be good for the success of the project. I could be wrong about that, if in the experience of more experienced people I'm closer to betraying Cheliax than it internally feels like I am."

"That's a plausible reason for Ferrer Maillol to make that decision.  It is, according to his reports, mostly what he decided and why."

"When you end up in the Grand High Priestess's chamber, it means that matters have gone beyond the mortal and are dealing in the plans and interventions of gods.  Such as, for example, the intervention of Asmodeus that started up this project."

"Do you believe that the feelings of love between you and Keltham are part of a plan that Asmodeus made?"

"I don't know. Asmodeus - called him my teacher, and said I wasn't to be separated from him. That suggests to me that Asmodeus intends some consequence of me learning closely from Keltham, and the obvious one is that it makes me better at the project. I don't know whether feelings are like humor in being costly for Our Lord to predict. If Asmodeus chose where or when Keltham landed, and it seems He might have, or have been part of a coalition that decided that, He chose to land Keltham on me, and that must've been because of some feature of me that lent his plans a better chance of success, and it seems like a notable feature of me, that apparently I have feelings - uh, uncertainty, what share of approximately loyal Asmodeans would have this problem -"

"The way in which you and Keltham have matched, the speed with which you have seduced and corrupted a boy steeped in Lawful Good beyond all imagining, the speed with which he has seduced you, the twisting events that managed to bring it all about, are not only far beyond the reach of mortal coincidence, but also beyond Asmodeus's ability to make plans about individual mortals interacting, as I have ever seen those plans demonstrated before."

"With prophecy shattered, there are exactly two forces known to us, named to us, that could possibly still be responsible."

"First, 'tropes', which may or may not exist."

"Second, Nethys."

Well Carissa doesn't like either of those at all!!

"Your thoughts as to what the Grand High Priestess should do about that?"

So far, things have worked out well for Cheliax and Asmodeus. They have locked away Asmodeus's competitor; they are in the middle of conquering Nidal, the first meaningful territorial expansion of Asmodean Cheliax. They have all Nidal's diamonds, and will come out of the war richer than they started it, not to mention with most of their casters strengthened. Honestly in the Grand High Priestess's place she'd be tempted to declare they should stop while ahead and kill everyone, except Otolmens instructed that Keltham be contained, and probably there are all kinds of people chomping at the bit to raise him. 

What does Nethys want. Almost unanswerable. He did warn them of Nidal's attack. He likes magic and explosions. There'll be lots of explosions if Keltham teaches Cheliax the weaponry of his world. Maybe Nethys thinks Cheliax is competent to prevent Keltham from destroying the world while allowing him the chance to advance the field by thousands of years. Maybe Nethys is trying to explode Cheliax.

What do the tropes want. For Keltham to have an interesting sex life, Keltham thinks, for the holes that his Lawful Good society left in him to be filled, for him to realize his shape isn't an error. Maybe Keltham being seduced into Evil is satisfactory to the tropes. 

When Sevar has not spoken for a time - it is still not clear whether or not Rugatonn is reading her mind - Rugatonn speaks again.

"A further factor, one highly relevant to my decision whether or not to have your feelings corrected.  We have just received instructions from Hell that we are to cease that particular policy by which temple-instructed children seen to have fond feelings for other children are noted by their instructors for additional correction in the form of being forced to do Evil deeds that train those feelings out of them.  They will still receive universal training in Asmodeanism, but children who display fondness for others will not be singled out by the instructors for such further correction."

"That this would reflect any change in Asmodeus's doctrine is essentially unthinkable, so why is Hell telling us to do that?"

What.

"May I make myself smarter, Most High?"

"You may."

Fox's Cunning.

She should have noticed faster that she was confused by all Asmodeus's unAsmodean instructions. No, that's not quite fair to herself, she noticed it was weird, and drew conclusions - specifically it's how she concluded Asmodeus cared more about their succeeding than their being Asmodean. Backtrace, now. You don't know the reason why. Asmodeus is giving unAsmodean instructions. It's not because He has changed his mind. It's -

"He and Abadar - or He and Irori - have a deal? Most High?" It has not escaped Carissa that Irori might be involved in the effort to bring a more perfect person to Golarion and that this might be why she was warned not to think herself too like Irori.

"Not in that particular regard.  This is specifically and narrowly something that a Good god, alone, would request from Asmodeus, if they had delivered to our Lord something else that He wanted."

"Very likely, the bargain involves no net decrease in the number of souls Asmodeus receives in the end.  There is little that He will trade for souls, other than souls.  But Asmodeus is not fonder of kindly souls than cruel ones, once they are delivered to Him in Hell, whereas to Good gods that does make a difference in how much they whine."

"Some Good god has merchanted Him additional souls, somehow, and taken a few naive children in trade.  I would be amused to hear what Good's mortal followers might say of that, if they knew.  Dabbling in the soul trade is supposed to be very Evil, after all."

"One may further remark that the entire affair is rather more Chaotic Good than Lawful Good or Neutral Good."

"I...didn't know we make deals with the Chaotic Good gods." On account of how they're incredibly stupid.

"Our Lord is the Lord of compacts.  Asmodeus will deal with anyone that deals with Him.  Though, in that case, He might have demanded to be paid before and not after."

Nod.

"And so the ultimate factor controlling my decision is simple.  Our Lord is known to be continuing to intervene.  We may hope, though with fear in our hearts, that He is actively monitoring this situation.  These events are obviously not Asmodeus's handiwork, but He is known to be bargaining and to be receiving things that He desires enough to pay for them.  It may be that much is hidden from His sight, it may be that it is not."

"It may be that our Lord would will these events to continue if He knew of them, it may be that He would have them stop.  If it is to my Lord's interests that these intricate events He could not have arranged Himself, continue to occur, then I can only work His will, in that case, by not disturbing them.  If I disturb them against His will, He will be realistically unable to tell me how to put them back on track even with a hundred visions and a thousand messages from Hell."

"If He wants it all shut down, one vision or one communication from Hell would suffice.  I would not ordinarily reason so, for every divine intervention is greatly costly to Him; I dare not imagine what other opportunities He has foregone, in this place or in others, for the sake of all this.  But here - He is intervening over and over."

"To make myself easy to control, across both cases of what my Lord could plausibly desire of me, I will allow this to continue unless my Lord tells me to stop, and pray that He is, indeed, paying that much attention."

"I am not going to refrain from having your feelings corrected at all, especially if it happens in a very predictable and Asmodean way in a particular case.  But having this strange entanglement shut down by hammering those feelings out of you - that I will not do.  Yet."

"Now, Sevar, do you think you are able to know all this, without that tempting you to do ridiculously complicated and unpredictable things in order to, as you imagine it, keep the plans of the gods on the track you imagine they were supposed to be on?"

Why would she be tempted to do ridiculously complicated and unpredictable things that would make it harder for Asmodeus to follow what's going on?

...probably what the Grand High Priestess means is that many normal human things are ridiculously complicated and unpredictable to Asmodeus so by default she'll be ridiculously complicated and unpredictable if she hasn't had explicit training in how to narrow her actions to the set that don't have that property. Evil dath ilani are probably so good at this. 

Without having had that training -

- what examples does she have of things that are complicated and unpredictable. Humor. Hives of ridiculous rumormongering. Keltham's experiments being deployed in the world. Sending Alexite Gellius Rutilus Thrune to the Worldwound because it'd be good for him. (She wasn't really going to do that, though, she just had fun thinking of it.) All of those feel too obvious, all of those would also be hard to predict for a human overseeing the project.....

"What errors will I make, what ways of clouding things for Asmodeus will I fall into, if I am only trying to avoid doing things that'd be surprising or unpredictable to you and failing to take into account the ways in which Asmodeus is in predicting me more limited?"

"I don't think you're supposed to do even that, at this point.  You are working to somebody else's plan and they have, if not prophecy, then something like a last shattered fragment of it."

"And Sevar.  Trying to be predictable on purpose can make you less predictable to our Lord, or even to me, because most people are not trying to be predictable when they make decisions, just deciding them.  Thinking like that makes you less like most of the mortals our Lord has observed before.  And if you are new to the work you will make new entertaining errors in what it means to be predictable, which I will not have time to correct.  Or the whole way in which it is one more thing you are trying to do, tinkering and steering the way in which you imagine your thought processes should work, complicates those processes in a way that, again, our Lord may find harder to understand -"

"I don't suppose I'm making any sense to you at all, yet.  I pray that it is 'yet' and not 'ever'.  You have no idea how much I am praying for it.  Meanwhile, don't try to do any incredibly complicated new things inside your mind, in order to make yourself more predictable, is that a simple enough instruction for you to understand?"

"Yes, Most High."

Keltham would understand more than that. Dath ilan would understand more than that. She's suddenly sure of it.

"Good.  I have come to a conclusion about what level of intelligence in you best suits our Lord."

"Give me your headband."

What if instead they just torture her until she's incapable of feelings??

She hands it over. The Fox's Cunning hasn't quite worn off so she doesn't feel the absence, yet. 

Aspexia reaches into her desk, takes out what is obviously a +4 intelligence headband, hands it back.

"I am pleased to see you more reasonable than some wizards," she says.

She puts it on. 

Is she more reasonable than some wizards. Are there wizards who'd actually refuse to give the Grand High Priestess their headband if in her judgment they shouldn't have it. If it serves Hell for Carissa to be turned into a slug then she wouldn't refuse, even if it's obviously worse than thousands of years of torture.

"They wouldn't have refused outright, but they might have tried to argue and plead before doing it, or, if they were wise enough to obey immediately, would at once start whining why it was the wrong decision and they should have it back."  It is again not clear whether Rugatonn actually needs to be reading Carissa's mind, or even her face, to know what she is thinking here.

"Now, what matter is it that actually brought you here today?  I have a certain guess, but I am not, as mentioned, infallible."

"I want to request command of Project Lawful, Most High, and ask you about a directive that is heretical and that I think will make the people on it better at their jobs."

"Mm.  Some might consider it insubordinate, very extremely insubordinate, un-Asmodean even, to react to a superior's refusal of their brilliant suggestion by going over his head, all the way up to the Grand High Priestess's office, storming in to demand not only that he be overruled but also that she herself be in charge from then on."

Carissa thinks it is against the written rules, and also there are unwritten rules, and whether it is against them is more complicated. She doesn't wholly approve of this; it's obviously the same principle by which Thrunes are allowed to gossip, and it seems to her that it'd be better for Cheliax if they weren't, but she must be wrong about that, that's all there is to it, and if there are unwritten rules, then here they bring her.

"Do you consider it so, Most High."

"It is certainly a transgression.  Some such are excusable depending on circumstances.  Some such are beneficial but still punished."

And she is pretty sure this is one of those, but she doesn't know which, and isn't sure it matters for what she ought to have done.

She hands over both pieces of paper she has. 

Aspexia does smile sometimes.  She is smiling right now.  "I seem to be looking at a piece of paper you wrote, signed by Ferrer Maillol, saying that you have business for the Grand High Priestess, and another piece of paper in his own hand, indicating that Maillol is not confident in his vision and unable to judge yours.  That, I admit, is not exactly what I expected to see.  Does Maillol know you are also requesting command of his project, Sevar?"

It actually hadn't occurred to her that Aspexia Rugatonn might not have known that, despite all her own disclaimers of non-omniscience and also the fact that there's no way she would have. 

"Yes, he does. He said I can have it if I can convince someone to give it to me."

"This really has been an unusually good day," says Aspexia Rugatonn.  "A god-war ended, an Otolmens event that is much more helpful to us than usual, Abrogail learning a valuable lesson, Keltham significantly corrupted, and now this.  No transgression, then, and no punishment.  Either Maillol is weaker in his will than I thought, or stronger in his loyalty to our Lord's interests, or you got some unexpected leverage over him to force him to do this.  And no, I won't inquire which was the case, they are all Asmodean enough."

"And this heretical directive, the vision that Maillol could not judge?"

"I think that punishments as presently implemented in Cheliax are in the short term bad for the sort of acuity required for this project. I know that finding an approach to punishment which doesn't have that problem is probably among the most important priorities of building Evil dath ilanism. Until it's figured out I want punishments beyond those issued in Taldor to go through me, to be approved if I think they'll make people better at the project and not otherwise, with exceptions for me, Pilar, and one randomly chosen further student, who will be subject to punishment normally."

"That will be hard on the random student, if they must suffer so unfairly.  It's not that I don't think it's funny, but I assume you have some other reason than that?"

"It's how Evil dath ilan would do it. To check if I'm right that the punishments are making the students worse. If that one performs notably well, then I was wrong, and we can resume punishing everyone; if that one underperforms, then I have more reason to think I'm right. Eyes everywhere. If you want to know something the first thing to try is checking it."

"Encouraging."

"...you have absolutely no idea how much I wish - I maybe shouldn't even think this, it is giving him too much information about Golarion, it feels intuitively dangerous in ways I don't know how to - but if Keltham could have explained to him, some cases of when our Lord tried to give guidance and mortals ruined it, disguised and changed in the details, and asked to discourse to you all upon the Law of obeying a commander who is having trouble seeing you clearly and can talk to you almost not at all -"

"I do not think you are supposed to do anything about this wish.  I think it is too dangerous, I'm not even sure why, but I feel that it must be, somehow.  Do not try to do anything about it without consulting me."

"But, remember the thought."

Aspexia Rugatonn takes out an already-written parchment, makes some swift corrections, signs it, and hands it across the desk.

The parchment grants Carissa Sevar authority and responsibility over Project Pet Outsider Project Lawful, with Ferrer Maillol answering to her as chief operations officer and commanding if she cannot, with Sevar herself answerable to a seventh-circle priest of Asmodeus who will reside on-site.

At the bottom are also some rather severe punishment codes for Carissa Sevar, not to be undergone for at least a week and delayable for up until two months after that.  Those however have now been crossed out, in the same ink that wrote the signature.

Well all right then.

It was already written, except that she'd have Maillol's approval. That's kind of terrifying what with how Carissa didn't herself make this decision until an hour ago. Of course, the Grand High Priestess should be kind of terrifying. 

"May it serve Asmodeus," she says. "That's all I had."

"I... have a suspicion, that Pilar will be the only success of your project, in the end, other than yourself," Rugatonn says.  "Maybe even including yourself.  I have a suspicion that it is not possible to do this without pain and correction that the other students will prove unable to endure.  I think what you are trying to do is make a devil native to Golarion, but better and far faster than Hell can do it, and I suspect that Pilar will prove to be the only one who can take it once you have given up on showing mercy to the others and found that you also cannot punish them enough."

"Or I could be vastly - how did Keltham put it - outracing my own ability to think, and pretending that I can see such things as Asmodeus may see when He is paying attention.  But.  Do not expend Pilar without need."

"I was thinking - it doesn't have to be possible to achieve with everyone - if we can take ten million Chelish people and get ten of you, that's more than worth everything. Especially if we can identify them in advance as being able to take it."

"Wrong.  One of me is worth a million Chelish citizens, ten of me is not worth ten million.  And do not forget Abrogail's insight - which I should have seen myself, perhaps, but her crown is admittedly more powerful than mine - that depending on what bargains our Lord may have made to bring Keltham here, or even what spies may learn from us, it may be that we must compete against students from Osirion and Lastwall, being taught in kinder ways and without falling into what their own gods more permissively deem to be heresy.  Ten Aspexias will not compete against that.  It is not even the right sort of military."

Then it'll be good news, if this Law can't be taught mercifully, if the girls who are punished do better. 

She doesn't expect it, though.

If they corrupt Keltham, though, that'd be an edge Lastwall and Osirion won't be able to duplicate for a long time. 

"I understand, Most High."

"Go with Asmodeus.  You are dismissed."

"Oh, and don't forget to act on the way out like you were here to instruct me and not the other way around."  Rugatonn chuckles briefly, smiles briefly, and nobody else in this office is going to see the slightest hint that it isn't genuine.

The primary purpose of this manipulation of the runaway rumor elemental is of course to corrupt Sevar herself, in this case with pride.  Aspexia has not forgotten that Irori may still be in contest for her, among other possibilities being considered.

If people believe that then they're all so stupid it's astonishing they function! It's not like Contessa Lrilatha's contract, which was a plausible lie, a world they could easily really have been in.

But it is fun. 

Carissa steps out of Aspexia Rugatonn's office, looking satisfied with herself. "Pilar?" she says cheerfully to the room that contains only people who are not Pilar. "I'm in the mood for some fun."

"Oh, nice!  I mean - I'm at your service, of course."

WHY IS SHE IN THE GRAND HIGH PRIESTESS'S WAITING ROOM WITH CARISSA SEVAR?

Carissa surveys the room as if deciding whether anyone else in it is any fun and then walks away down the hallway with an arm around Pilar. "Aspexia's welcome to join us," she calls at the Grand High Priestess's secretary as she rounds the corner.

She would LITERALLY DIE RIGHT NOW if she hadn't JUST DONE THAT YESTERDAY.

Pilar performs a cantrip, she's had time to hang them again between deliveries.

Message to Carissa Sevar:  "What is going on and what am I supposed to be doing?"

"High Priestess has asked me to make a production of being the person calling the shots around here. Because there are going to be spies trying to understand Project Lawful and apparently it serves us for them to learn this. I am also confused. Does your curse require us to actually have fun, I can't fuck you because I promised Keltham I wouldn't."

"It is possible to do fun things to me besides fucking me but I could also give you a cookie, I guess?  I'm still figuring out how this curse works and, just mentioning this to anyone with authority, I have an increasing suspicion that if I don't throw somebody an impressive surprise party on purpose very soon it is going to happen anyways."

"Who won't say anything about it. ...Abarco. Let's throw Abarco a surprise Carissa's now your boss party."

"I... this is so awful, I want to do that too, but my curse won't let me.  The party has to be - for them, not for us making fun of them.  Stupid Good is still Good."

"Wait, you're Abarco's boss now?"

"I am now project director. Though you're still the Grand High Priestess's favorite. You could throw Asmodia a surprise welcome-back-from-Hell party?" Carissa steers them towards Maillol's office.

Pilar frowns.  "You'd think that would go through but it doesn't."

"Can you use this to figure out peoples' deep motivations -" surprise party for the Queen, Carissa Sevar has gotten herself into trouble and you can statue her now - that's definitely eight kinds of illegal - "surprise party for Maillol about me taking over the project."

"...no answer.  You can use it to figure out the motivations of people with respect to things you actually want to throw them a for-them party about, is I'm suspecting my curse's answer here.  Would you maybe - have not totally sincerely wanted to congratulate Asmodia on coming back from Hell?"

"....no I think I would've wanted to! She's strikingly good at math and I am worried she doesn't have the discipline to keep contributing to the project if she's getting tortured a lot, I was torn between hoping Hell'd helped with the discipline and hoping it hadn't kicked her back into her shell so she's harder to use. ....I have no idea what Chaotic Good thinks of either of those motivations."

Pilar has now been repeatedly and directly exposed to Project Lawful's hidden power source, a thing called a 'dath ilani' in its own language, for multiple hours over sequential days.  This has consequences.

"Do we know anybody else back from Hell?" Pilar says.  "Maybe it doesn't work on Hell-related things."

All the rumored weirdness and all the real weirdness is only a distraction from the true effects of dath ilani exposure, though a very effective distraction if your mental language lacks even the conceptual vocabulary to describe what Project Lawful is actually about.

"Maillol? I don't know if he went to Hell or just to judgment. Balaguerre and Torres, on Security."

"...we don't want to throw them a party.  We want to know if my curse works on Hell things.  I hate Chaotic Good so fucking much."

"Hey, imagine how much harder Asmodeus' life would be if Good were not incredibly stupid. You're a very powerful argument for Asmodeanism, just bopping around where Keltham can see you." 

"It's possible they know that, Elysium said that I was truly loyal to Asmodeus and so Good would prefer not to use me against Him and my being oracled would end up with Lord Asmodeus being better off than if I hadn't been.  The Grand High Priestess thought that was credible but ominous, and that maybe there was a bigger plan against His interests, like the plan is to destroy Cheliax and then I end up preventing a new Worldwound from opening in the crater."

"....well. All right, then. ...wait, why does Good prefer not to use people loyal to Asmodeus against Him? I did not know that! Did you know that? Does that mean they'll actually give up and fuck off, once everyone's loyal to Asmodeus?"

"I mean, it was, what they prefer, not what they always do, according to them.  But I'm not actually an expert on Chaotic Good and would rather not learn."

(This about Pilar Pineda:  She walks through Cheliax a lot less nervously than others.  It's fine and proper if she's punished fairly, and even an unfair punishment isn't so terrible.  Her loyalty to Lord Asmodeus is, if not absolute, strong enough for her to feel pretty confident in it.  If Pilar says anything that sounds questionable, anyone who checks her loyalty will discover that she is thinking all the proper things under Detect Thoughts.  It's fine for Pilar to say that she'd rather not learn about Chaotic Good, because any superior who rounds on her for that will find Pilar humbly saying that of course she'd do it if ordered, she'd never dream of not following orders.  Scan Pilar as you like with Detect Thoughts, you will find that she is absolutely sincere about that, and not in the way of somebody having to suppress a lot of thoughts either.  Cheliax is safe for her, and if she is executed there, she gets to go home.)

"Keltham might, at some point, ask," Carissa says, a little sharply because Pilar should have thought of that. 

And then they're at Maillol's office.

"SURPRISE!  YOU'RE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR PROJECT LAWFUL ANYMORE!"

It's going to take a long time to get all the confetti out of this office.

CONGRATULATIONS!  You've reached the end of the first "thread" of this story!

SURPRISE!  There's even more to read though!

Primary continuation:

some human relationships are less universal than others

Less intense, more sfw, tldr spoilers version of next thread (reunites with main threads afterwards)

tldr some human relationships

You can also click where it says "Next Post" to automatically go on to the next thread in the continuity ("some human relationships" in this case).  This is an important glowfic-reading skill to remember when you reach the end of the next thread, and need to go on to the one after that!

A timeline of MICWOA / Planecrash Book 1 can be found here.

#planecrash-lagging is a Discord channel for starting threads to blog your reactions while catching up.

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