Ooh, the crown loves bending followers to its will~! It vibrates excitedly atop her head, while she stands uncomfortably beneath it.

"I grant you the power to read their feeble little minds."

Some sort of energy flows from the chained figure to the crown.

The crown laps it up eagerly, nearly bubbling with excitement. It's honestly adorable, even though it's also deeply concerning.

Then it finally takes her home properly, and she trudges down the steps and flops into the grass next to her temple, feeling exhausted and terrified and generally overwhelmed.

Her crown doesn't understand at first, and she's not sure she wants to explain. But it keeps pestering her, and after what feels like an hour of enduring its concerned prodding, she sighs and rolls over and buries her face in her hands so she won't accidentally say any of this aloud.

Can anyone other than you read my mind? she asks.

An immediate flood of reassurance. Of course not!! The crown is hers now, and she its bearer; their bond is as close and tight as a soul's bond to its body. Closer, even. No one could ever come between them.

Really? But you used to belong to—that one—and they can do things like give you that power...

It does still hold some fondness for its former bearer, of course. But that was then, and this is now. She doesn't have to be afraid. Her crown will keep her safe beneath it. Also, reading minds is really fun!! She should try it!!

...they're all asleep, she points out. I don't want to go rummaging around in the dormitory and wake everybody up, they'll be cranky.

Oh but couldn't she unpocket those new followers?

That, she's forced to admit, is actually probably a good idea. Unless... Are they awake in there right now?

The crown concedes that they are not really exactly conscious, and will in fact pop out well-rested regardless of when she releases them, accounting for the inherent stress of the transit method.

Then I think I'd better let them out first thing in the morning instead, so they don't wake everybody else up going to bed, or end up staying up all night and getting cranky about that.

The crown reluctantly admits that this is probably for the best, even though it really, really wants to show off her new mindreading power.

Luckily the sky is already beginning to brighten in anticipation of morning. She spends the meantime attempting to start a garden in a newly cleared corner of the encampment, as far away from her sleeping followers as possible.

By dawn's early light, the horsefolk she rescued introduces himself as Hano, and the defeated creature as Barbatos. Barbatos gratefully accepts a transformation into, for some reason, a vibrantly teal catfolk.

Do catfolk normally come in vibrantly teal??? Whatever. Probably best not to question it.

With a quiet sigh, she allows the crown to reach out and touch Barbatos's mind as soon as they settle back to the ground. Her new follower's thoughts unfold into her awareness like a blossoming flower, and, okay, she can see her crown's point, there's something to that. There's something to the fact that she can just see the lingering shadows of anxiety and uncertainty melting away into an untroubled faith—setting aside for the moment how fucking creepy that is—and see, too, the genuine gratitude for new hands and new fur and not having the entire top of one's head be a big ugly mouth. It's obvious how this makes her followers easier to manipulate... but it also makes them easier to sympathize with.

Okay, she tells her crown, we can read everybody's minds if you want.

Yaaaay~! It bounces up and down like an excited child. She can't help smiling as she makes the rounds, letting the crown touch everyone's minds. This is also how she finds out what Ratau meant about performing blessings for them: a few moments of her personal attention, with her crown quietly extending its presence, and her dazzled followers increase not only their feelings of personal loyalty for her but also some kind of underlying resonance, a low note that only her crown can hear, and which her crown is very, very excited about.

Overall it's a peaceful morning. She finishes transplanting the scattered berry bushes into neat rows that mimic what she saw at Ratau's cottage, and coaxes her crown to help her transmute some spare stone into a nice big clay pot she can make stew in, and helps Pajul finish cutting down one of the more stubborn trees, and gets four walls and a door onto the dormitory, and teaches Meron and Amdusias how to lay thatch so they can help her finish the roof. (It's a good thing she can read everyone's minds or she would be starting to forget all their names at this point. She's never needed to keep this many names straight before in her life.)

Around noon, she calls a halt to all the work so she can portion out the stew. Everyone is thrilled about it—genuinely thrilled, too, like they've never met someone who can cook before in their lives. It's weird. She tries to ask if anyone wants to learn the extremely simple recipe but it turns out they're all nervous about the fire, half out of the sensible primal fear that any reasonable person has for that which burns, half out of... she tries not to physically squint as she examines their thoughts... some kind of deep intuition that a flame is a sacred thing they are not worthy to use.

Hey crown, she asks. If we're going around declaring doctrines anyway, can I come up with one about how cooking is great and everybody should get to do it?

It isn't sure, but it doesn't think so. Oh, but speaking of declaring doctrines! She should give another sermon after lunch, and then maybe #$%&$% and perhaps if they're lucky ^^&*#$%#@...

I'm not sure I caught all that, but if you want to do a sermon, sure, I don't see why not.

On the way to the temple she stops by the shrine to pick up its collected Devotion, and her crown changes its mind. She's seized by inspiration and pours out materials in a haze of power, and when she comes back to herself, the crude stick-and-twig effigy has been replaced by a taller, more finely sculpted statue. Of herself. Made of stone. There's a great big stone statue of herself in the middle of this clearing and it's leaking black fluid from the eyes.

Okay. Fine. Anyway. What was that all about, exactly?

Her crown explains that a better statue (with better runestones—see, it made the runestones better too, carved them a little sharper, pressed them more firmly into the ground) can hold more Devotion and support a broader range of Inspirations. And because ((*&%$@, the Shrine being better also improves the Temple—look at her followers decorating the door with flowering vines, they can sense its new power. Now she can give an even better Sermon there!!

...the Lamb takes a moment to reflect on how utterly bizarre her life has gotten. Then she heads into the Temple to preach to her flock.

This time she's more aware of herself and her followers during the process. This awareness is... not a comfort. She is, no two ways about it, reaching into their minds to mold them to her will—or more accurately, her crown is doing that through her. She is not sure she wants to be doing this, but it's what she's doing, and she'd better learn to like it because the One Below will probably murder her if she stops.

After the sermon, she senses that faint resonance through her crown again, and how in the wake of her, let's face it, mind control, everyone is resonating just a little louder. Her crown is so excited about this. She's having a little trouble mustering a positive reaction to that at the moment, though.

Her crown thinks for a bit... and then unpockets something into her hand. She has to stare at the pretty beaded necklace for several seconds before she remembers picking it up, at some point during one of her Darkwood jaunts.

The crown nudges her through the departing crowd of followers and touches their minds one by one until it finds Valefar, the second defeated creature. It suggests that she give them the necklace.

...why? she asks, feeling lost and confused and more than a little wary.

Followers like being given things, and maybe making her followers happy will cheer her up! Also, if she gives this one a present now, something really good and important might happen!

Okay. Fine. She clears her throat awkwardly and then just sort of hands Valefar the necklace.

Valefar clasps it ecstatically. Their mind bubbles with excitement and happiness. Their loyalty deepens. Their resonance peaks.

Their eyes glow with an unearthly light.

What.

Her crown, vibrating with anticipation, leans forward and connects with Valefar. It's less of a one-way channel like when the crown drinks Devotion out of shrines, and more like an exchange of energy in which each participant strengthens the other. Valefar staggers back, dazed and blinking, and the crown reads in their thoughts how blessed they feel, and feels in their soul how it was nourished by this contact. Meanwhile the crown has collected its own reward: the same stuff that's contained in Commandment Stone fragments, the power that allows a crown to declare Doctrines. They should have enough now to make another one!

...that's... acceptable. Maybe. She's honestly still pretty concerned.

But okay, she'll head back into the temple to do another Doctrine assembly.

This time, again, her bond with her crown is deeper and it can show her more clearly what her options are. The selection is pretty hazy, but there's one possibility she latches onto as it spins by.

I can teach my followers that there's an afterlife they should be happy about? But will that actually grant them one, or will I just be lying to them about what they can expect after death? I don't know what happens to dead people normally but I've never imagined it's anything good.

The crown pokes uncertainly through her thoughts, trying to understand the distinction she's asking after, before finally replying. No, telling her followers to believe in an afterlife doesn't grant them one. If she wants to affect what happens to her followers after death, she must do it with an act of her power—either sacrificing them to become part of her crown, or ascending them to grant their spirits peace and comfort. Ascension would be an easy Doctrine to declare from here, if she wanted! They just have to **$#%) and then lean in this direction and loop that through here and... the crown pauses, waiting politely for her to give the go-ahead before it finalizes the decision.

Yes. Yes, if she can grant her followers peace and comfort after death, she would love to be able to do that.

The Doctrine goes through. Her assembled followers cheer and praise her generosity.

She mostly hopes it's never going to come up.

There's more gardening to be done in the afternoon, and more blessings to give out, and more Devotion to collect. Her crown excitedly Inspires her with the knowledge of how to use coins and wood or coins and stone to generate much more of whichever resource than you started with, but she doesn't have enough coin on hand to actually build such a thing.

After enough blessings, several more of her followers glow with that unearthly light, and she lets her crown pull power from them and grant them strength in exchange. It's enough, apparently, to declare another Doctrine.

The previous one went well enough that she feels pretty okay about doing another. Into the Temple she goes.

Her crown explains to her amid the extransensory upheaval of Doctrine assembly that if she wants to not lie to her followers about the afterlife, she can instead impress upon them that to be sacrificed to her glory is a worthy cause.

I don't want to do that either!

She must eventually pick one or the other, or be forever held back from the fullness of her doctrinal might. It's because of the &$#*() and the !!)@#( and the way the #$@$ lines up just so; at each level of each branch of the edifice of doctrine, a balance can be tipped to one side or another. When she chose Ascension she was giving up on declaring a right to murder her followers at whim; in retrospect, her crown probably should have told her that, but it was excited to be able to offer her the Ascension ritual and suspected she wouldn't feel like she was missing much.

...you're right about that, she admits, shivering slightly. Ugh, just the thought of getting up there and shoving 'I get to kill you whenever I want' into everyone's heads... no. Absolutely not.

(Her crown is so pleased that it guessed right!)

But... this question of Afterlife or Sacrifice... what am I giving up, if I just never make a choice there?

Among other things, the power to bring back the dead!

—fucking EXCUSE ME?! —fine, yes, all right, I'll take Sacrifice if it'll lead me down the road to resurrection. That's worth it. I'm not sure what else could be worth that, but resurrection is.

The loop is closed, the decision set, the Doctrine declared. Her crown is gleeful.

Her followers are concerningly excited about their new belief, and the Lamb feels like she needs a nap, except she can't fucking sleep anymore. Instead she digs grumpily in the garden until night falls and she decides to head back out into the Darkwood.

Leshy greets her almost as soon as she comes through the gate.

"Finally... let us end this. I'll be awaiting you in my temple... come! Witness true power."

She hates the sensation of being spoken to by Bishops so much. Ugh.

Well, as ominous as that was, at least maybe it'll mean she gets to fight Leshy soon. And hopefully kill him. Though at this point... no, she's not going to finish that thought. Fuck off, thought. You're a stupid thought. She is going to kick Leshy's enormous leafy ass and rip the crown from his head and fucking eat it or something, and that's that.

With renewed determination, she sets out into the woods.

Cultists, leaf monsters, grass, bones, the occasional rock.

Another cryptic encounter with Clauneck, but this time one of the cards is familiar: the telescope she found in the woods earlier.

She hesitates, but then picks the other one, with a picture of a spider. Her crown being able to give her directions is useful, but the more different ones of these things she tries, the more she'll be able to figure out about what they all do.

A few clearings later, Leshy makes another appearance.

"Your persistence is beginning to ANNOY me, little Lamb."