Having been granted rulership over the city of Vanhoover, and confessed their feelings for each other, Lex Legis and Sonata Dusk have started a new life together. But the challenges of rulership, and a relationship, are more than they bargained for.
Lex’s eyes snapped open, bridging the gap between sleep and total wakefulness in a single jarring instant the way he always did.
It was a horrible way to wake up, which made it a perfect match for the horrible nightmares that plagued him every night, of which last night had been no exception. It was enough to make Lex grit his teeth in bitter disappointment. Although he’d known better than to get his hopes up, he hadn’t been able to stop himself from wondering if maybe, just maybe, he’d turned a corner on controlling that tulpa the Night Mare had inflicted on him. After all, it had come to his aid twice yesterday, and so when Sonata had helped him stumble to one of the outpatient tents last night, he’d found himself daring to consider the possibility that for the first time in almost a year, he’d be able to have a night’s peace.
He hadn’t. If anything, his nightmares were worse now; the events of yesterday had given that spiteful fragment of his mind plenty of new horrors to torment him with, and it had seen fit to use all of them. Just the thought of that being what his nights would be like from now on was almost enough to drive Lex into another bout of despair like the one that had gripped him in the aftermath of the battle, but this time he caught himself, shoving the emotion away before it could envelope him. I was able to control it at least a little yesterday. He let out a slow breath as he held onto that thought. That’s the beginning of being able to control it permanently. Perhaps even reintegrating it back into my greater cognitive framework. This is progress.
Nodding to himself, he put the matter out of his thoughts, knowing that there were more important tasks that needed to be attended to, of which confirming the camp’s current security was the most immediate. Although Aria had reported that she’d found no ghouls last night after she and Severance returned from checking the battlefield, Lex couldn’t help but be suspicious as to whether or not the undead ponies were completely gone, and not just because that could result in another preventable death. Those things reproduce via transmitting a disease. If even one of them is still in Vanhoover, it could start this all over again, he knew.
Nor was that the only situation that required immediate attention. Today marked the second day of everypony going without food, which meant that a solution had to be enacted as soon as possible. Only marginally less urgent was the cleanup in the aftermath of last night’s battle; there was currently a battlefield with two thousand ghouls’ worth of body parts right outside, which in the summer heat would turn into a serious health hazard in very short order if something wasn’t done. (Especially if a disease contracted that way was also capable of turning living ponies into ghouls.)
The rail lines also needed to be reopened. An emergency supply of rainclouds needed to be ordered from Cloudsdale. Restoration of Vanhoover proper needed to begin so everypony could start moving back in. Someone had to be sent to Las Pegasus to negotiate a loan in order to pay for it all. And all of it, as he’d mentioned to Sonata last night while they were waiting for her sister to return from patrolling for surviving ghouls, needed to happen as soon as equinely possible.
The war to retake Vanhoover had been won. Now the city needed to be actually reclaimed.
Despite knowing that, Lex made no move to get up from the bedroll he was lying on. Or rather, he couldn’t get up; there was a body lying on top of him. Despite not being able to see her, he knew who it was immediately, since she’d laid down with him last night. Sonata.
Hidden beneath his cloak, which was now draped over him like a blanket – Sonata having retrieved it on their way to the tent last night, after the doctors had moved to attend to Fencer – Lex couldn’t help but take a moment to indulge in her closeness. She was half-draped over him, her head resting on his chest, and every breath she took made the soft, feminine curves of her body press against him. She was lightly embracing him, clinging to him gently even in her sleep. Her back legs were intertwined with his own in a manner not dissimilar to the aftermath of the last time they’d expressed their love physically, back in that warehouse in Vanhoover.
Despite the impossibility of getting up without displacing her, Lex couldn’t help but try, shifting slightly to try and move out from underneath her. But a stabbing pain through his muscles let him know that he wasn’t anywhere near recovered enough to attempt such a thing, and he abandoned the attempt immediately. “Sonata,” he murmured, unable to bring himself to speak more harshly; the kiss that they’d shared last night in the wake of the battle was still fresh in his mind. “Sonata, wake up.”
Her only response was a quiet grunt and a slight squeeze around his middle, clinging to him tighter and bringing a smile to his lips. “Sonata, wake up,” he repeated, still keeping his voice just above a whisper. Raising a hoof, he gently pushed back the top of his cloak, revealing her beautiful blonde curls and charcoal coat-
-and went rigid as he realized that he’d misidentified the mare on top of him. “Wh-, Nosey?!”
That last word left his lips at a considerably higher decibel level, and it was enough to make the mare in question raise her head blearily, blinking as she looked around before her eyes locked onto his. “Ah…” He felt her tense up then, and the look that crossed her face was uncharacteristically demure, biting her lip before she looked down shyly. “G-good morning…”
Lex reflexively struggled to get up again, her unexpected presence and unusual behavior only unnerving him further. “What do you mean ‘good m-,’ what are you doing here?!” He used his circlet to check for magical auras then, but found only those from his own magic items and protective enchantments. That knowledge calmed him only a little, however.
“Sorry.” She winced slightly as she said it, slowly separating herself from him. She climbed out from under his cloak, but only to the point where she was lying next to him instead of on top of him. “Sonata said it was okay.”
“She said what was okay? Where is she?” With Nosey’s weight gone, Lex managed to sit up, though the effort made his body scream in protest.
Nosey’s horn glowed as she picked up her glasses from the far corner of the tent, taking a deep breath as she put them on. When she spoke next, she sounded more like her usual self. “You were already asleep, so I asked her if it was alright for me to sleep in here with you guys. She said, and I quote, ‘don’t worry about it.’ As for your second question, she left a little while ago to go get food.”
Lex’s eyes widened in horror. “She did what?!” He almost turned to shadow right then – able to feel that his dark magic had replenished itself now that he’d rested – so that he could go outside, struck by a sudden urge to go confirm Sonata’s absence for himself. But he managed to quell that impulse, knowing that Nosey was his best source of information at the moment.
Nosey nodded. “She thought you might freak out, so she woke me up before she left. She wanted me to tell you that she’s going to take some of those bits you gathered and a bunch of ponies and go get food for everyone from one of the farms nearby.” Nosey neglected to mention that Sonata’s exit had also been her cue to move from sleeping across from Lex to sharing his bedroll, having known instinctively that being in contact with him would keep Xiriel out of her dreams.
For a moment Lex couldn’t even react, his stomach clenching so hard that he was momentarily nauseous. “When did she leave?” he croaked.
Nosey blinked, then glanced at the tent flap, where bright sunlight was streaming in from around its edges. “I don’t know. A few hours ago at least. I think it was around dawn. Why?”
Lex didn’t answer, simply staring into space as he tried to fight down a rising tide of panic. If Sonata had left several hours ago, then there was no way to catch up to her, not that he knew precisely where she’d gone anyway. Which meant that, short of preparing and casting his spell to send and receive a short message with someone – the only long-range communication spell he could use now, since his scrying spell required an ornate mirror that he no longer had – there was no way to know if she was alright. Which means if wherever she’d headed has another monster like Xiriel, or some more ghouls, or something else that she can’t handle, she’ll end up just like Cloudbank and the others! If that happened…
It took him only a fraction of a second to locate his saddlebags, set off in another corner of the tent, and he all but telekinetically ripped them open, bringing out the large ruby that he’d gotten from the Night Mare. It was only when it was held within his purple aura that he felt his heartbeat slow down, a shudder of relief working its way through him. Although resurrecting Sonata was far less desirable than protecting her from harm in the first place, it was much better than having her be lost to him forever. No matter that the Night Mare had directed him to use it to bring back Cloudbank; if he had to risk the goddess’s anger to be reunited with his beloved, then so be it!
“…Lex? What’s that?”
Nosey’s voice brought him back to sanity, and Lex licked his suddenly-dry lips as he started to calm down. What was he thinking? There was no evidence to suggest that any of the nearby farms were a danger to anyone, no reason to presume that Sonata was headed into danger.
There was no evidence of Xiriel’s existence either, came the voiceless words from his shadow.
A shudder went down Lex’s spine at that, and he fought to keep his composure intact. There had been evidence about Xiriel’s existence, such as the necromantic aura around Block Party; he had just failed to decipher it in time! The same was not true here! After all, the camp ponies had been raiding those farms for at least a little while, and based on what Lex knew none of them had encountered anything dangerous or even overly unusual. More likely, the biggest issue Sonata would encounter would be transportation problems for whatever she managed to acquire, since there were no wagons or carts in the camp for her to use.
Belatedly realizing that Nosey was still looking at him, he shoved the ruby back in his saddlebag. “It’s nothing you need to be concerned about,” he mumbled, chagrined that he’d let her get a glimpse of it. Despite her unusual behavior (which was doubtlessly a reaction to what she’d been through, even if he couldn’t figure out how), Nosey was still a reporter; it would be a disaster if everypony else learned that he had a spell that was capable of resurrecting one and only one person. The last thing he needed was to be inundated with ponies that wanted someone they’d lost to be the one brought back…which reminded him that there was another item on the list of things that needed to be done: examine the spell embedded in that gemstone in greater detail and see if he could reverse-engineer it.
Because if he could, and could add it to his personal repertoire of spells, then he wouldn’t need to be limited to bringing just one person back.
But that was a project that wasn’t time-sensitive, or at least not as much as other problems that needed to be taken care of. It was with that thought in mind that Lex clenched his jaw, struggling to climb to all fours. “I need to check on things,” he grunted, somehow managing to stand. Now if he could just move without falling over…
Nosey was by his side instantly, pressing her body again his. “Let me help.” Her horn was already glowing, moving to put his saddlebags on him, then his cloak.
“I don’t-” He almost snapped at her, still embarrassed by her having been in bed with him barely a minute ago. But he caught himself at the last instant, remembering what he’d realized yesterday: that Nosey was his friend. And assisting him like this…this was what friends did, right? “…alright.”
She gave him a warm smile in response, and side-by-side the two of them exited the tent.
The morning after the battle, Lex takes stock of what needs to be done next, with Nosey a little too close at his side.
At this point it's a matter of when, rather than if, the next monkey wrench will hit his plans.
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Progress on the friendship front...well, for Lex that is. Nosey on the other hand...though I wonder if this is what Sonata meant when she gave Nosey the okay to sleep with them. I mean, she was agitated by Nosey's closeness to Lex before (as well as his praising Aria) so what changed?
Speaking of Sonata, rather nice of her to take the initiative, likely done so to alleviate some of the burden of caring for his 'little ponies' after he had done so much. Hopefully Cozy won't misconstrue Sonata not being by Lex's side if and when they encounter each other halfway. The mare is already on thin ice with Sonata so hopefully she won't prod any further in on her relationship with Lex or else there's going to be conflict.
If Lex thought he was having a bad time so far, he hasnt walked out into the crowd of cheering for the saviour crowd outside.
Sonata might have somone in their foraging party noting down which farms have what, in supplies, prices, responses, because she thinks its the sort of thing Lex would like, even if she remembers after a bit and only some of it?
9031868 Sonata gave Nosey permission to sleep in the same tent as them, and that was all. She didn't say that Nosey could drape herself over Lex in such an intimate manner. From the chapter (emphasis mine):
Nosey simply took advantage of the situation after Sonata left:
So nothing with Sonata changed; Nosey was just taking some liberties with her friend's kindness. Of course, she's still heavily traumatized as to what happened before, so she was doubtlessly just trying to secure her own peace of mind. Right?
As for Sonata setting out to take care of the food situation herself, that is rather nice of her, as well as forward-thinking. No doubt, she knows that Lex would start pushing himself immediately after waking up, and is trying to take at least a little bit off of his plate. Let's just hope that it all goes smoothly!
9032156 What reaction everypony will have to Lex now remains to be seen. Hopefully it'll be good, after what he and the others accomplished last night (not to mention all of the other stuff he's done), but given how rough things seem to go for him, that's far from certain.
One can only hope that Sonata thought of what you outlined! Given that she's not a very detail-oriented pony, it's easy to imagine her not realizing that she's overlooked something important when she's halfway through the task. Hopefully she's brought someone competent along with her.
so how is Lex going to react to Sonata asking about forming a heard with Nosey?
9033273 As funny as that would be, I somehow doubt that'll happen, if for no other reason than "herds" are a fan-made idea that aren't actually part of the show proper. (Which isn't to say that I'm ruling anything out; I'm just not utilizing "fanon" ideas. The show doesn't tell us that polygamy is normalized in Equestria, so I'm not assuming it is here.)
9032335
That's fair. I think the Research system from Ultimate Intrigue would work really well here for Mihir in the great library of Heaven. (If he had actually had the time). That's one of my favorite subsystems, if only because you get to basically attack the library.
I figured if Mihir can get access to a bunch of 9th level scrolls, he can probably get access to another copy of the same ioun stone.
You're not the first person to have told me this when discussing how a setting should/does work. I'm not an author myself, so I usually don't approach things from the perspective of narrative tension and good story.
These are also the guys who sent out Tabris. I think it's supposed to be as complete a guide as possible to everything going on in all the planes of the multiverse (an ideal, rather than an achievable goal). Severance, as an artifact of a deity who resides in an outer plane, would normally fit in here. Now, as previously discussed, the deities of Everglow might be off the beaten path enough that Severance and the Nightmare got missed by Tabris or whatever other scholar was studying the outer planes. That said, I would think it reasonable that with enough research in the Harmonious Scripture library, you could figure out how to destroy Visineir, the personal artifact of Mephistopheles, as an example.
I'm not really quibbling about the levels of Celestia and Luna, mostly because we don't have a minimum level for when beings can grant spells. It's only relevant in the context of "would Mihir consider this person deity enough to be worth his time mentoring?" Related note, I just learned new lore reading through Blood of the Coven that is relevant here. Apparently witch patrons are similar to deities granting spells, but much less powerful. It even says that deities almost never grant spells to witches themselves, having less powerful outsiders do it instead. Obviously this is just fluffy lore with no tables or numbers. That said, I would be open to the idea that even an 8th level character, if they had a few mythic tiers, could act as a witch patron, which sounds more believable than granting divine spells.
I've always believed that we should use that, and Occam's Razor is a solid way of doing this, especially in regards to larger economic, political, or technological questions, that game systems are less well-equipped to model.
So this is where it gets tricky. If you are using a particular rule set in a holistic manner, then you should follow it in assuming the characters you build have all the powers of their level, and base their level on the most powerful thing you see them do.
So when would I say Aragorn has laser eye blasts that we are never shown? Well Aragorn is a ranger. If I see him do something in the books that only a high level ranger can do, like Quarry, and if "laser eye blasts" was an ability that all rangers had to earn before getting Quarry, then I would say Aragorn can shoot laser eye blasts. Of course, if there are times that it would be advantageous to shoot lasers from his eyes and Aragorn doesn't do that (and isn't shooting lasers from your eyes advantageous all the time? People say Superman should do it a lot more often), then I would try and fit Aragorn to a different class or archetype that traded out eye lasers. Or I would admit that the Pathfinder class system doesn't really work for heroes in this book series, and switch to building him with a points-based class system like... (you know the rest).
So what's the most powerful thing we see Aragorn do? Well, we see him use his magic to heal Faramir, and it sure as heck ain't simple hit point damage Faramir is suffering. I'd say it was either Cure Disease, or Soothing Mud to remove ability damage, either way a 3rd level spell that a 10th-11th ranger would have.
10th level would also mean Aragorn could have taken Favored Enemy Undead 3 times and have a +6 to Bluff and Sense Motives when he accomplishes the incredible task of getting an army of the dead to fight at his side.
I think a good approach is to imagine the book, or movie, or other piece of fantasy in question as an Adventure Path, one where the plot and setting are created first, then the stats of the monsters, hazards and skill checks, then finally the level guidelines of the PCs.
Anywho, way to tease us with the romantic stuff about Sonata, only to reveal it was Nosey instead. I notice Sonata seems like she is much more worried that Aria will somehow steal away her man than Nosey will, which seems silly, since Sonata should be able to tell Lex find Aria pretty repulsive on every level.
I wonder what pair of ponies Sonata will run into out along the road?
9037488
The Research subsystem is better than simply making a Knowledge check when trying to find something out becomes a critical plot point, but it's not exactly the best sort of thing for what we're talking about here, in my mind. The major issue is that, as amusing as the whole "attacking the library" thing is (particularly since you give the library a CR), the fact that the library can't "attack" back means that there's no real dramatic tension, with a single exception: time. There needs to be some sort of critical aspect around "beating the clock" with how fast you can find something out in order to make the "combat" have any tension. Otherwise it's just busywork. (There's also the whole "penalty for failure" thing, but that's largely dependent on there being some other element in play for that failure to catalyze.)
The Research rules themselves admit this, under "Step 7--Determine the Time Pressure":
This gets back into issues of the presumption of availability of various magical items, albeit writ large for an entire plane of existence and a high-level denizen therein. It also runs into issues of narrative progression, i.e. having an angel just say "yeah, there's a scroll for that. Hang tight while I grab some stuff that'll let me solve this for you" is boring, which is the cardinal sin for story-writing. I understand that there's an equal issue regarding internal logic and self-consistency regarding the question of "but don't they have the resources on hand to just fix this right now?", but the thing of it is that I'm not entirely certain that they do. Even if Heaven is an entire plane of existence, and even if the angels and archons do function well together, I hesitate to say that they have on-demand access to any magic item that they need, all the time.
Why? Because that doesn't seem to fit their presentation, since that level of on-hand access to powerful magic items would give them an edge that the fiends (i.e. demons and devils) simply wouldn't be able to match, due to their inherent factionalization (for devils) and in-fighting (for demons). And yet it's the celestials that are typically portrayed as being somewhat outnumbered, possibly outgunned (on a macro-scale), and preferring to wage an indirect campaign, rather than having superior firepower (which is what having that level of magic item access would be). They quite clearly have some powerful magic items, but it's too permissive to say that everything's on the proverbial table.
Moreover, even if we put all of that aside, there are still political concerns to deal with. Heaven can't simply go around ticking off evil gods by breaking their stuff willy-nilly; that's a good way to start an interplanar war, and is the main reason why most planar powers tend to use mortals as intermediaries. That whole "95% chance of attracting the attention of a powerful being connected to the artifact" isn't something he wants to bring down on Heaven, or Equestria for that matter. Likewise, claiming "the paramount nature of goodness means that they wouldn't mind upsetting the forces of evil" isn't a counterpoint, either. Much like in the real-world, military action (let alone provocation that could result in military action) is something that's used only sparingly, even despite an overwhelming difference in power between actors. That's because resource expenditure, casualties, and other long-term consequences generate fallout that most people don't want to deal with, not when there are other avenues of engagement available (with mortals and their realm being the ultimate "cold war," since the planar powers have collectively agreed to let it develop (mostly) on its own).
Even having wishes and miracles to throw around doesn't negate those consequences either; hence what I said before about why there wasn't a mass-resurrection of the angels that Severance slew. Money isn't infinite either, nor can it be easily created, and that's a salient point since that's what it costs to make magic items (and buy components for some spells). It's like asking why most high-level Outsiders don't have a +5 inherent bonus to every stat thanks to their wish or miracle spell-like abilities (though I suppose some people assume they already do); you could go that route in theory; in actuality there are going to be consequences for doing so, and it's better not to.
Politics is everywhere, in other words, and can't be avoided.
Let's take another look at this. Tabris was "ordered to study the whole of the multiverse." Okay, except the "multiverse" for that setting consists of some nineteen planes of existence, with a bunch of demiplanes. That's not exactly little, but it's not like that composes every aspect of existence; the end of The Witchwar Legacy says, for example, that Baba Yaga sent Tashanna "beyond Golarion's cosmology" (as I recall), and strongly implies that she's Iggwilv, from Greyhawk. So that right there opens up that there are multiple cosmologies out there. That's in line with D&D's lore also: Lords of Madness says (pg.8-9) that a gate spell can cross cosmologies, as well as individual planes of existence.
So in other words, Tabris didn't go around and search everything; since there are potentially infinite cosmologies out there, each with multiple planes of existence, many with multiple layers, which are themselves infinite, he quite simply should never have returned at all. Ergo, he didn't search everything. For that matter, even if he had, Heaven doesn't have access to his results anyway: the Book of the Damned that he wrote vanished from their archives shortly after they exiled him. Even then, while the book "purportedly" contains all knowledge of evil in existence - the word "purportedly" being the operative term - the Book paradoxically only covers Hell, the Abyss, and Abaddon; presuming that the Night Mare doesn't live there (it's never been established), she's outside of its scope anyway.
Ultimately, the idea of Heaven having on-demand knowledge of everything evil is something that strikes me as less plausible than on-demand high-level magic items. There's a reason why the actual wiki entry for that library that I quoted in my previous post just talks about cultural knowledge, rather than the level of information you're describing.
That's not the context that I'm operating from, though. The idea of "solar angel mentors new godling" is certainly a viable one, but it's not presumptive. (I don't know if that's written in one of Pathfinders books on angels - certainly I don't remember it - but I should note that I don't find the canon to be the ne plus ultra of this story's rules, hence why I'm using third-party and D&D 3.5 stuff as necessary.)
That's mildly interesting, but only because Paizo has done absolutely nothing with the idea of witch patrons up until now. Unfortunately, this isn't very helpful for fleshing them out, since it opens up the idea that "powerful Outsiders" can grant spells without actually telling us what constitutes "powerful" and if they have to be Outsiders. For that matter, why don't the gods do it themselves? Is it because they can't be bothered? Would it be too much of a power drain? Something else entirely? And why is granting arcane spells of up to 9th level something that "less powerful" Outsiders can do whereas granting divine spells is (apparently) harder, requiring gods to do it? There's no answer to any of these questions within the context of the game itself, which makes the whole thing rather pointless from a narrative or world-building standpoint.
The problem with these is that humans, unto themselves, have dabbled with numerous and often contradictory systems for the things you mention (i.e. economics, politics, and technology), which undercuts the idea of a presumptive "baseline" from which to draw. There's a reason why the Sean K. Reynolds article I linked to is with regards to biology and doesn't go much further. The more you move away from that and toward social constructs, the shakier it becomes. You can still use it, of course, but that's dependent on having contextual clues about the situation in question, rather than being able to draw quasi-universal conclusions.
And this, right here, is a major part of the reason why class-level systems lost their luster for me. What you've outlined here is the main reason why it's so difficult to represent a lot of fictional characters under Pathfinder and similar systems, because the placing of powers and abilities that are necessary for representing them at specific levels for specific classes - forcing you to take everything (with some limited trading, due to archetypes and prestige classes) prior to reaching those levels - undercuts the entire process. This means that you'll quite often end up with a character that not only won't have the power(s) they do in the source material (typically due to needing more levels than they have available to achieve them if the needed abilities are spread among several different classes), but they'll have multiple other powers that don't fit their theme. It's no coincidence that most people who hate the idea of the ranger class having spells cite Aragorn as a precedent (and unsurprisingly, Pathfinder 2E's ranger is spell-less)...which brings up the much less notable issues of how you interpret the source material, and the powers that you use to mimic it.
Quite so ; it was no idle statement when Thoth said the same thing on his article on this topic.
Sonata has a lot of baggage where her sister is concerned. Not so much for her bestie, whom she apparently trusts quite a lot. Let's hope she's not wrong to do so.
Friends with benefits! The benefit of no nightmares!
9221439 So far that's what it seems to be, but you have to wonder if having your girlfriend's best friend spending the night in bed with you is a sustainable arrangement...