Hal Patagon, holding court in the Supplicant-Flapping Room at the Antarctican Royal Palace
Two swims to the Hour of Filibustering, Autumn 17-

It's odd you should ask me that, Sir Henry. I would think it should be obvious to all of you why I would choose to live here amongst the Antarcticans rather than back home in England where I was born. You are all of good and noble blood. Should not my reasons be immediately apparent to you? No? Very well, permit me to explain.

I am, as Sir Henry has rightly pointed out, an Englishman. Good catch there, Sir Henry... I can see there's nothing that gets by you, particularly if it's been sugar glazed. Back in England, my family is of moderate rank, wealth, and priviledge, and as some of you may know I was born in line for a minor baronetcy. It can be difficult living as a low-ranking noble in Europe; the peasants rarely show proper deference, the knights see you as pretentious, and the higher nobility regard you as something of an intermediary between themselves and their stable-boys. Do not mistake me, my lords and ladies, I would never dream of casting aspersions on the proper breeding and behaviour of our fellow nobility -- at least, not those outside of France -- but none-the-less many nobles often act with a, shall we say, "minimal" amount of respect for baronets and equivalent titles in various countries. That being said, my blood is as blue as any of yours, and my family had wealth aplenty. I had fine schooling, good company, all the dueling training I could stand and the finest foods of England (meaning, of course, the lower-class cuisine of Germany). I had everything that a noble should except for one thing, which I hope will become clear to each of you presently.

It was when I was traveling in Europe in my twentieth year that I met my first Antarctican. A group of them was touring some of the old castles of Holy Rome at the same time as my companions, and our parties met. I had heard stories of the Antarctican nobility, of course, but then, we all hear outlandish tales daily and we learn to put stock only in those told by people who have a genuine reputation of always telling the truth. The Antarcticans had come to Europe via one of their hot ait balloons, making a small detour on the way to stop by the Moon and purchase some of the fine Moon breads I am sure you all enjoy as much as I do. A Belgian in my traveling party, a base and unpleasant brute, found the Antarcticans curious appearance and clothes comical, and laughed at them loudly to their faces, and the Antarcticans were quite justified in calling a duel to defend their honour. Well, my entire company rose to the challenge, but there were twice as many Europeans as Antarcticans, and it was clear that the brave Antarcticans, the wronged party, would be cut down! To the shock of my companions I drew my sword and moved to stand alongside the Southerners! I tell you in all modesty that I was not fighting at my best that day, sick as I was at the thought of fighting fellow European nobles, and I myself dispatched only four of them, receiving no less than two cuts to my shirt in the process. The Antarcticans, for their part, recognised a man of true noble blood when they met him, and as my own companions were no longer fit for travel, they invited me to journey with them. I graciously accepted, and we concluded our tour of the Roman castles before I returned with them to Antarctica.

Do pay attention, Sir Henry. I'm getting to the important bit.

Well, I need not describe to all of you the wonders of the Antarctican ice-palaces. They were surely the most astounding feats of architecture I had ever seen, more amazing than the tower at Pisa, the Vatican, or the undergound throne rooms of the gnomes beneath Bavaria! My greatest shock came when the leader of the Antarctican party asked nme if I would like to stay and live among them. As you have all noticed by now, the Antarticans have some difficulty speaking Europe's languages and routinely hire trustworthy Europeans to act as their translators. Wishing nothing more than to stay to live in Antarctica, I agreed. Only when I already agreed did my new friend inform me that he was the prince, next in line to be the Antarctican emperor! Why, your graces, I was so shocked that my heart actually stopped and it was three hours before it restarted, but fortunately the Antarcticans are used to this and have excellent vests which can keep the body warm and functional until the shock abates and the heart restarts. It was a scant few months later that the old emperor chose to retire and his son took over, making me his Viceroy, as I am now.

Do you understand, Sir Henry? What of you, Lady Elizabeth? No? I suppose not. This is why the courtiers brought you to my audience chambers instead of directly to the emperor.

In England, I would have been a baronet, and a minor one at that. I would have been below all of you in status, even below our good Sir Henry who, though only a knight, has many friends in the English peerage. In Antarctica, I am second only to the emperor and my word is his! It is my pleasure to meet with all of his majesty's most honoured guests in the mornings, to act as his translator and storyteller, and with his least honoured guests in the afternoons, to waste their time, delay them, and generally spend my time insulting them at my leisure. It is my great pleasure to serve the emperor in both capacities.

And now, if you will all excuse me, I know you have spent the whole day waiting to see the emperor, but I am afraid it is time for me to take my tea. Perhaps the emperor will have time to see you tommorow. I will come to see you all some time after lunch to let you know. Have a pleasant evening.

Prince Jack the Knave, somewhere he insists he's never been
The Book of Contrivance, The Parables of Jack the Knave, Chapter 1, verses 2-42

       2: Trust me; would I lie to you?
       3: What is truth? Truth is the expression of an idea in a form which is perceived as accurate given the facts available and biases ingrained.
       4: There is absolute truth, truth which remains true despite the belief of others', and there is insolute truth, truth that is true only if the correct person hears it.
       5: Most things in this life, the vast majority, are insolute truths, and those few truth which are absolute, in the supremest irony, are all too often assumed by most listeners to be false.
       6: Everything you know is wrong, at least in part.
       7: If you know something which today appears to be wholly and truly correct, you have only to give us time and someone will find a way for it to be wrong.
       8: So, what is truth? Truth, more often than not, is what you believe it to be.
       9: The better someone is at persuading you what the truth is, the more you believe them, and as a result the more truth they actually tell you, at least from your point of view.
       10: Trust me; even when I am lying to you, I am telling the truth; I never lie.
       11: I have never told a lie in my life, and upon my soul I swear, I am not a dishonest man.
       12: I tell the truth, and nothing but the truth.
       13: The question is, what truth do I tell you? I tell you the truth which I want to be true the most, because if you believe it, then it is true for you.
       14: Reality itself is shaped of truths like these; I tell you the things which will change your reality.
       15: I want your reality to be more compliant... warmer, friendlier, more loving, happier, for the both of us.
       16: In the interest of helping you to live in a better world, I will tell you the truth.
       17: I will tell you a lot of truths, frequently.
       18: Sometimes they will be truths you have a hard time believing, and sometimes they might be truths against which you have clear evidence, but it is still the truth.
       19: I don't tell the truth to suit my own needs; I tell the truth to help you.
       20: Sometimes I may profit from the truths I tell you; sometimes I may profit more than you.
       21: Sometimes after I have told you a particularly big truth, you may be left with the distinct impression that you have not profited from it at all, or even quite the opposite.
       22: Take solace in knowing that I only ever told you the complete and unvarnished truth.
       23: Trust me.
       24: Everything I am saying now is true; why would it not be? I have no reason to lie to you at all.
       25: The last thing I would want is to tell you anything that was untrue.
       26: I have no patience with those who lie.
       27: People who lie to others are often caught and seldom believed.
       28: A single lie risks guaranteeing that for the rest of time people will assume that everything else which is said is a lie; if you only tell the truth, if you are known to only ever tell the truth, people will assume you tell the truth.
       29: This is why I always tell the truth, no matter what.
       30: I tell you what I think is true; you can ask no more of any person than that.
       31: Blame not the one who would lie to you, however; I am honest and you are honest, but can we hold others to such a standard? Not everyone can love truth as we do.
       32: Always shall the world know those who will lie to meet their own ends.
       33: Shall we hate these misguided? We must not, for truth allows no room for hate.
       34: In truth we know that all are the same and all are connected, and all must be respected.
       35: Be always wary that others might lie to you, because trust has to be earned.
       36: Of course, the fact that I would tell you this just goes to show how I will always tell you the truth; Trust me.
       37: I could not lie to you if I wanted to; The whole universe is defined by perception, from subatomic particles to national identities.
       38: Once you learn to change your perceptions, you learn to see what is true and what is not, and you see that everything is true.
       39: In truth, I could not lie to you even if I wanted to, because I perceive truth in everything I say, even those things I know to be innacurate, and how can a lie exist without intent to spread untruth? Only someone with the most limited of perceptions can conceive of the possibility of a lie existing.
       40: I will always tell you the truth... how could I not?
       41: Trust me; I always tell the truth.
       42: I am an honest man, but you can call me Jack.

Clayton Paulo, personal journal
The year of our Lord 1476

Last night I very nearly stayed up to watch the sunrise. I miss the sun. In my mortal days, I loved the night, for that was the time when I could skulk about the city streets and do my best business. The drug trade lends itself by nature to the shadows, and the shadows are always deepest just past the mid of night when all good folk are home in their beds and the alleys between their homes belong to the predators: criminals and city watchmen. In my youth I prefered the night to the day, until the day came when I was no longer afforded that choice. Now, when the sun's rays would be lethal to me, I regret that I did not spend more time basking in it when I could. Curious, the things we miss most.

I never thought I would say this, but I grow tired of life. I find myself seriously considering if it is worth continuing to exist in this fashion, or if I should simply ensure that I will feel no pain and then find a way to end things.

I celebrated my fifty-sixth birthday last week. I say celebrate; in actual fact I hired a lady of the night, rendered her senseless on cowbane, and drank enough of her blood to reduce myself to drugged unconsciousness. There was a time in my life when I knew better than to partake of my own wares, but these nights I find that they are the only thing which makes passing the long hours tolerable. To think, I once felt only contempt for the overindulgers amongst my customers, but today I can understand what feelings motivated them. Far easier to sleep than to face the streets outside. I think perhaps I am feeling my age, and this depresses me. I never dreamed I would live to see my forty-sixth year, as indeed neither of my parents did. I would be an old man now if I still aged, and between the passage of time and this ridiculous war with the Turks, it seems everything I know has been all but wiped out. I have no family left among the living. The last of my nephews was apparently killed in battle near the Mediterranean coast three months ago, and it took me this long to discover it because there were no others to carry the news back to me. I am indeed the last of my family line. And not the last living man of House Paulo... even this honor is denied me. Even Venice itself crumbles under the weight of war, and I feel as though nothing remains of my once-proud home-city. What is there left for me now?

And yet, I cannot help but remember the man I was before that night at Guaconi's. That young Clayton would be ashamed to read what I now write. He would regard me with the same contempt that I had for the melancholy folk of the time. When Guaconi's allies drained us dry and when Hardestadt tried to turn us into his foot soldiers, I fought. I fought to live, when fate had clearly decreed that I should not, and when it would surely have been easier and less painful to give in. I fought because at that age, fighting was the only thing I knew how to do. Above all else, I swore to myself, I would do what it took to survive. I fought back against Guaconi and I would have fought fang to fang with any of them, with no chance of survival, because I did not know how to give up. The only thing I had truly learned during my short life was how to survive. How ashamed the mortal Clayton would be to see me now, bemoaning the curse which my life -- my all but eternal life -- has become.

No. I forswear this. Life cannot be a curse. Certainly there are the poor and the afflicted who have suffered greater than I and for less reward. Should I give in to despair? Even in death, I have made of myself a success, surrounded by wealth greater than I had in life. A merchant of the House of Paulo, reduced to whinging? Intolerable! My father, Devil treasure his soul, would laugh himself to the sanatorium if he saw my behaviour these last weeks. Perhaps too much success has made me complacent, even bored. I am young (of a sort), beautiful (if I choose to be), rich (though I could hardly explain how I became so to the doge), and in the greatest city in the world (even if somewhat diminished by the Turks these last decades). All of this I have, and yet still I despair. It is right that I say that the man I was would be ashamed to see me sitting here. For that matter, I am ashamed of myself.

I have outlived everyone I once loved, but why? I have outlived them because even tonight, still I know only that one thing. I have lived this long -- yes, lived! -- because I know no other way. Clayton Paulo is not a drug dealer, though he has these skills. He is not a spy, though he has earned his keep in this way. I am a survivor. A survivor. I could no more walk out into the sun tommorow than I could slit my own throat, and I refuse to be a man who would wish to. I have survived to this night because I choose to be a man who will not die, and the fates have seen fit to make this true literally as well as figuratively. I refuse to sit here and contemplate my own oblivion. If my family is gone then perhaps it is my duty to carry on the name myself, even if no one must ever know I carry it. I begin to remember what it felt like to be willing to fight to see another moonrise. Whatever else happens, I swear that I will live, and I will do whatever I must to ensure this. I will not yield. I will survive. May the Church itself help anyone who would stand in my way, because no lesser force will stop me.

Away with this quill. The night is young and this opium will serve me better in another's veins than in my own.

Tan'El, in the Hall of Judgement of the Grand Temple of G'Dank
Alloted ten minutes for his last words before sentencing is passed

I am Tan'El.

I should like to begin by thanking your gathered excellencies for giving me this time to speak before you. Short as the trial of Tan'El has been, I would have hoped I might be allowed extra time to speak on my behalf, but it seems this is not so. It is fortunate for us all that I shall not require even the maximum time you have granted me. I plead guilty to all crimes of which you accuse me. So too do I refuse to acknowledge that you have any authority over me.

I am Tan'El.

I plead guilty to you, gathered honoured ones, because this is what you wish to hear. It is true only in the context of this chamber. According to the True Law, I m guilty of no crimes. According to the True Law, I could not possibly be guilty of crimes. The eloquent and learned justicar argued that I am guilty of such crimes as murder, theft, destruction of property, and vandalism of sacred icons. I commited every act that he described. None of them were crimes.

I am Tan'El.

Wise ones, I pity you. By the Chains, you are a sorry gathering. So many wise and learned men in a single cathedral, so many grey and white beards have you gathered. I can but imagine the hours which you have passed debating the finer points of your laws. I am certain that you have collectively passed lifetimes struggling to inerpret your laws justly and fairly so that they might be applied to all and leave all satisfied with its judgements. Still have you never crafted a law which binds Tan'El. Your many laws do much to preserve the peace and protect the weak, but they are nothing in the face of the True Law. You live in your walled cities away from the world and tell yourselves that you know the universe. As I admire your goals so too do I pity your delusions. You know nothing of the True Law. Your every unnatural law exists to supress it and hide it from your people. This is supremely ironic to mine eyes, for you men are men of power and deserve to rule under the True Law. All of your power should be yours; I begrudge it not. It is tragic only to see such power suandered on frivolous and futile pursuits. You are truly lost to the True Law.

I am Tan'El.

The True Law is the only law which truly governs this world or any other: the strong survive, the weak perish. You wise ones, you are the strong. You deserve to rule as you do. You have proven your power. How much worse that you then waste your power extending false laws to the weak. You wish to protect your peasants? This is your right, and if you have the power to protect them from those who would take them, you deserve to keep them. Your guardsmen had the power to defeat me and capture me, and Tan'El acknowledges their strength and respects it. I had the strength to kill many of them before they stopped me and took from me my sword... how can this be murder, when clearly they deserved to die? All of you wise ones listened closely to the evidence presented against Tan'El, and know that I did not strike first. I came to this city in peace, intending only to purchase supplies, and your guardsmen attacked me. I defended myself, none can deny this. Perhaps you will argue I defended myself with unecessary force, but I say there is no such thing so long as more guardsmen charged me. Your guardsmen sought to arrest me for crimes committed elsewhere, but I refuse to acknowledge your right to determine that any such crimes existed. I performed all of the acts for which your guardsmen attacked me, but no single act was criminal.

I am Tan'El.

Justice is the predator hunting the prey, for if it is strong it will kill the weak and live another day. Justice is the prey escaping the predator if it is strong enough or clever enough or quick enough to do so. Justice is the great warrior who strikes down the weak one who dares threaten him. Justice is the weak warrior who abases himself before the strong, recognizing a foe against whom he could not prevail. Is it wrong for a mighty warrior to crush an ant? It is dishonourable, and I swear to you by the Chains that never have I struck an unworthy opponent unless he had struck at me first, but it can hardly be unjust. The strong should never destroy indiscriminately, but if they choose too then this is their right. Such brutality is beneath Tan'El, who lives strictly by the True Law and has ever been a man of unblemished honour. I have killed many and if I leave this chamber alive I shall kill again, but it shall be in honourable combat, and it shall be not in defiance or ignorance but in apathy of your laws. Your laws are not laws at all and so I refute your claims that I have ever, in any place or time, comitted any meaningful crime.

I am Tan'El.

So come, wise ones. Step forth, learned greybeards. Rain down on me the punishment you see fit, for it is within your power to do so. You are stronger than Tan'El and my fate is in your hands. This is in keeping with the True Law, and this is just. I acknowledge your authority to crush me for breaking your rules, however arbitrary. Extend your mighty hand and strike me down, but bore me not with bold pronouncements of your laws and your invented crimes. But I tell you this now, excellencies: I am Tan'El. I am That Which Endures. I am the strong. Punish me well or punish me not at all, for if I survive this day I shall surely return here again all the stronger in the future, and then we shall see whose law is the truest. By the Chains I swear this.

For I am Tan'El.

Lord Chorus Macendale, lecturing at Mjzzj Wizards' College
Spring, Year of the Arctic Fox

What is life?

No snickering, please. Any of you who considers this a foolish question may wish to reconsider your chosen career. We take life for granted, because we have always had it and, for the vast majority of us, once we no longer have it we will cease being concerned by anything that happened during it. That said, you are all alive right at this very moment -- except perhaps for that young fellow in the third row who thinks I won't notice he's asleep -- and the fact that all of you are here suggests to me, perhaps wronglly, that you all want to do something with your lives. So, I ask you again: what is life?

Life is energy. Life is movement, action, choice. Life is reaction to the environment to whatever degree a life form is capable of reaction. Life is screeching, eeping, and shrieking. That's what most of you spend your time doing, after all, if you think about it. I'm not criticizing; there's nothing wrong with shrieking and eeping, especially when you're young and have the energy for that sort of thing. If fact, I admire any of you who have resisted this school's efforts to crush your screeching out of you. You have to hold on to that inner energy, that inner *life*, if you want to succeed. Life is energy, and energy is magic.

For my next trick, I'm going to need a volunteer. You? Okay, fine. Stand up. Students, this is your classmate. Now, this is what he looks like covered in panicked ferrets.

FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO CAN STILL HEAR ME OVER THE NOISE, THIS IS WHAT LIFE SOUNDS LIKE. REMEMBER THIS SOUND FOR THE REST... ahem, for the rest of your lives. Right, calm down young man, they're gone. It was only a six-second spell. Look, you're hardly scratched, and I promise they carried no diseases.

Some of you may already know my reputation. I am a summoner. I have dedicated my life, those portions of it left available to me by affairs of state, to understanding the workings of summoning magic. I transport objects, animals, and people from one location to another. The truly extraordinary thing which my skills allow me is the ability to actually literally *create* life. I reach into the fundamental energies of the universe, the positive and negative energies if you will, and shape it into things that approximate genuine animals. At no time do I create real animals, but I can briefly make that energy *think* that it is the real animal, and for that brief time, the thought is the reality. Thought, reality. Energy, life. My thought becomes energy's life.

Some of you may wonder why I would dedicate myself to such a specialized and, shall we say, non-flashy field of magic. Many of you no dout entered this school in the hopes of one day bending the primal forces of creation and incinerating small towns with a gesture. While I admit that few things are as impressive as a well-placed fireball, let me assure you that there are few sights in your life that will stick with you more than the first time you drop a mammoth on someone's head. Of course, the diplomatic solution is the best solution to any crisis, but when diplomacy fails it's always good to have the mammoths available. Or, I suppose, the fireballs, if you have no imagination.

I have chosen to master summoning because I like life. I believe in protecting life, forstering life, nurturing life. Summoning magic is perhaps the purest expression of magic's ability to create, and not merely magic, but humanity itself. Any idiot can destroy, as I'm sure many of your classmates will prove in the coming years, but it takes a true genius to create. Look at the spellbooks in the school library and you *will* see that for every spell of creation, there are five dedicated to destroying, or at least hurting. This is because destroying is easy. It is easy, it is unimaginative, and it is closed-ended. When you destroy a wall, you no longer have to worry about that wall, although you may well have to worry about what will walk across your land that the wall might have kept out. If you instead create a gate, you have to worry about what it is made of, how is it shaped, what side has the hinges, what sound will it make when it opens... but the next day, you still have that wall to do whatever wall-oriented tasks you might need. It is a finer mind that builds instead of destroys. To take raw energy to shape it, not merely into inanimate objects and tools, but into complex living and even thinking creatures, this is the highest expression of magic and, for that matter, imagination and human potential. This is why I summon instead of burn. Life should be protected by life, and not merely by things which destroy other lives. Not all of you are studying magic with the intent of using it to preserve life, but as a Lord of the Land I have always felt that serving its people was my first and most important duty, and sometimes serving the people means standing between them and their enemies. It is much easier to face an enemy when you stand side by side with protectors and companions, even if those companions are energy which merely thinks that it's alive for a few hours. Summoning is just as useful, or more useful, for non-combat situations, and those of you will hope to work in domestic areas or even witin this university in the future will no doubt be able to think of countless uses for a reliable, obedient, and supernaturally-intelligent pet or three.

Finally, for the benefit of any of you who remain unconvinced, if you turn around now and look in the back of this auditorium you'll notice that I have actually been seated there for the duration of this lecture, taking notes as to which of you were paying attention, while this useful simulacrum of me gave my pre-written speech on my behalf. Hello, class.

You are dismissed for today. Reconvene in this hall tommorow and we will discuss the basic principles of summoning.

Ragon of Sorinia, somewhere in the in the ruins of a desecrated temple... really, it's better not to know
Anywhen

Let me tell you a ssstory...
Once upon a time, there was nothing. There was nothing for a very long time. A very very very long time. The thing about nothing is that it's quiet. Not much moves. There are very few squirrels. There was only one muffin, and it wasn't made of anything. Nothing is funny that way. Then there was something, because nothing is something which can't ever be alone or else you would have some nothings and no somethings. Nothing became something. It was green. It's hard to be sure that it was green, because there was no coherent frame of reference, and of course, no light to reflect or refract off of the object and thus give the perceptual illusion of colour to an outside observer. Still, it was green. Trussst me.
You can't have just nothing. That wouldn't make sense. There's always something. There has to be something or else nothing makes sense. Nothing makes no sense when nothing makes sense. Sense means nothing if sense makes nothing. Some nothing is better than no something.
But then there was something. Something was green. Something was alert. Something perceived. Perception presupposes interaction and assimilation; in absence of outside stimulus, perception is impossible save only for subjective perception, thus something perceived itself. Something perceived itself within an infinite expanse of nothingness, though there was nothing but itself and in itself. It perceived its own thoughts, and called itself I. In perceiving, it had mind. In having mind, it had identity. In having identity, it had awareness. In having awareness, and name, and perception, it Was I. I perceived myself and all around nothing else.
Awareness presupposes self-awareness. Perception presupposes interaction. Interaction presupposes extraneous others outside the self. And so I created the world around me, that I might interact. Interaction presupposes responsiveness, and so the world was responsive. Response presupposes stimulus, and so the world was capable of perceiving stimulus. For a time I busied myself interacting with the world rocks trees plants small furry animals rocks again threetwodimethylaminoethylonehydrogenindolfouryldihydrogenphosphate. This was profoundly unsatisfying because there was no one to play with, and so I mirrored mind and created sentience, as sentience presupposes intelligence against which sentience can be compared. Sentience is impossible in isolation; there is no "I" in singularity except to scribes and I hate scribes so if I ever see you carrying a quill I will eat your skin after I give you skin. Sentient life imposed chaos and disorder and this amused me to no end, and so I bade it to go out and split itself, subdivite and deviate from predetermined patterns and proceed tangentially according to spontaneous perceptions and experience. And when the world was full of different and unpreictable minds and selves I rose from my den and saw all my funny little squishy toys and I came out to play with them.
Becaussse it's fun.
That's why I'm doing this to you, if you were wondering. It's fun. It passes the time. it gives me something to do. I know you can't appreciate the story because I've already removed that part of your brain, but I know you understand because I made you. I made all life, and I made it because I would be bored if I was the only something there was, but lots of somethings means that there is always something new to do and see and take apart and put back together with new bits from other somethings. And I realisr that this must be agaonizingly painful for you but that's okay, because I made you and you aren't real. Nothing anywhere is real except for me. The evidence for this theory is obvious and incontrovertible; I know that I made everything and no one else knows they did, and thus I must have. If I made you, you do not truly exist except in so far as I perceive you. You do not exist and thus your pain does not exist, although I recognise that it feels grape sausage quite real to you which is presumably why you continue to scream the way you have been despite my asking you several times to stop. I hope the knowledge that you are not real brings you a great deal of comfort. It certainly comforts me to no end to know that whatever I do to you is done only to things which are not real. The important thing is that I am having fun. My fun is more important than your fun because I am real and you are not. My fun justifies anything. I do not expect you to understand this. I don't recall why I didn't create you to appreciate this fact; none of the squishies I play with seem to appreciate this situation as well as you mighy imagine, which I personally find quite inconsiderate and disapointing.
Entertainment is the only measureable measure of success in existence, you know. Everything else is subjective and open to irrational judgement. Any something can make a value judgement regarding the rightness or wrongness of the actions of another something but no something can objectively assess the entertainment which another something is experiencing. Given that I created all minds I am well aware of the infinite possible interpretations which minds can make of any concept. Thus, logically, entertainment is the only valid and valuable measure or whether something is worthwhile. All living things thus have the duty to do first whatever entertains them and then whatever entertains all other living things. From my more educated point of view, taking into account as it does the fact that only I am real and everything else is a creation of my fancy, I obviously have the duty to entertain myself first and all of my creations have the duty to entertain me before they entertain themssselves. I do not understand why everyone except for me has so much trouble understanding this elementary concept. If every creature would simply understand that its purpose of existence is to serve my every whim the whole of life would make so much more sense to everyone and everything. I know you would be happier if you accepted that your suffering had purpose and meaning and served the greatest good.
I think next I will try fusing your spleen to this oak tree. That sounds like it might be interesting. It's a fortunate thing you don't really exist or else this would be very unpleasant for you. Do not worry, though... it won't hurt me a bit.

Virrar Crysthalus, deep below the Arena, in a dungeon of the sort that even the jailers try to forget what they see there
2288 (Gerhyden Calendar)

I wish for you to know that it gives me no pleasure to see you like this. All of this, what has happened between us, is an unfortunate necessity. We have conflicting paths, you and I. It is nothing more than ill fortune that your path led you from your guild hall to my Arena. Did I not send you warnings? Did I not warn you away on no less than three occasions? You and I would never have been friends, sir, but we could at least have lived without becoming enemies. Now... now, I fear you shall not have the luxury of living at all. As I said, this gives me no pleasure, none at all. It pains me to employ the methods which I must. I will employ them, however. This is what you and I have in common: we are both men who will not balk at taking distatseful steps to accomplish their goals. It is simply a matter of preparation and planning that I am standing here and you are strapped into this machine. Had you prepared better than I, our positions would likely be reversed.

No, don't try to talk. It is unecessary. I can hear every word you think. Hence, again, our respective positions now.

Now, there is no need to be uncharitable. "Evil" is what we call anyone who is willing to take one step more than we are. I could call your order evil for its treatment of those of other faiths. I suppose you will argue that burning a heretic at the stake is less painful than the device you are in now, but let me assure you from experience that you are quite mistaken. The single mercy of your pyres is that they are faster, but take solace in knowing that you will not suffer for much longer.

Why? I can hardly believe you would have the temerity to think it. Because I must. Because if I was not willing to take these steps, then men like yourselves would descend on myself and my people and destroy us, as you do all perceived threats. When you storm goblin caves with your brothers-in-arms, do you stop to question which goblins are soldiers and which are their equivalent of civilians? Do not give me that excuse; of course they have civilians, if only those too old, infirm, or cowardly to defend themselves. You slaughter them all regardless, all for a few bits of copper and silver. In a single day my operations here take in a hundred times what you could earn from such butchery, and I take my pound of flesh only from those who can stand to lose it. No one forces the visitors here to gamble, any more than I force you to dress up in your armour and come here looking to crush my skull with that hammer of yours.

Now that is an interesting question. Let me see if I understand you correctly: you had an "obligation" to come here, is that right? Ah, I see. Yes, I suppose I can see how, from your point of view, you would feel you have such an obligation. After all, you have known for months that my agents were operating in your kingdom, that we have been sneaking out those you consider witches and warlocks. Yes, we were extorting money from your people; one of my lieutenants thought he was quite clever when he began to refer to it as "organized crime." Of course I admit to those assassinations, I ordered them myself, and I will stand by each one. Every one of those deaths made the whole of this world a better place by removing a narrow-minded, bigoted murderer from it, and the fact that they were murderers who happen to worship the same god as you justifies nothing to me.

That is a fascinating idea, though, the idea that you felt you had no choice but to come here and seek to destroy me because of the evils I have wrought in your homeland. Allow me to share with you a secret. Are you ready for it? I justify my actions with exactly the same logic. All of the blood on my hands and the gold in my coffers is there because I felt and still feel an obligation to do whatever I must to stop you and your kind from perpetuating horrific evils in my lands. This is the truest and most horrible tragedy and horror of it all, you know... that we each perform monstrous deeds because of the monstrous deeds which the other has already performed. I believe that your side commited the first deed, you believe that mine did, and in truth it does not matter one whit, because the cycle of horror perpetuates either way. Neither the universe nor the undertakers care who "started it," you whiny little god-botherer. The only thing that matters is who will end it, and since it is unlikely that either one of us could ever live in peace with the other, we each try to end the violence in the only manner available to us: the utter annihilation of the opposing faction.

It is merely unfortunate for you that I am far more efficient at perpetuating atrocity than you are. We would be in each others' places right now if you were as good at what you do as I am. Deep down, you are not upset that I am evil; you rail against the fact that I am better at what I do than you are.

And now, I am afraid our time is at an end. Conversation is a remarkable thing, you know... a focused mind is very dificult for a telepath to plunder, but a running mind, a mind consumed by anger, is like a fortress with its doors unbarred. I am pleased to say you have been kind enough to furnish me with the precise route and schedule that your high priest will be taking on his tour of the monasteries, and I am certain that we can arrange a suitable reception for him along the way. Now, don't be like that... didn't you come to my Arena because of the exactly the same logic?

Take solace in this: at least your pain is about to end.

KP 42, in (decaying) orbit around the planet MacGuffin
Twenty minutes from WCS (a very rapid rise in temperature and drop in elevation)

       Well, this is something I don't do every day.
       Credit where it's due, the engineers and techies who dedicate their lives to keeping my body running know how to build a first-rate combat suit. In theory, my outer armour is rated to withstand an explosive decompression, which is a pretty impressive feat of design if you think about it. if you're going to take a man-sized object and make it able to survive sudden exposure to hard vaccuum, it's got to be tough enough to withstand a sudden loss of about one hundred kilopascals worth of pressure as well as about two hundred and seventy degrees kelvin, preventig the soft and meaty contents from freezing or exploding. Not that so much of me is still made of meat, but the important bits are, and those are the ones I'd dearly like to keep unexploded. It turns out that not only is my armour vaccuum-rated in theory, it's also vaccuum rated in practice, as I've had occasion to learn thanks to my brilliant idea of being on the viewing deck of a capital ship during a ship-to-ship barrage. Since I can tell that the Pale Blue Dot next to me is getting closer and closer, and the ship I've just fallen out of is currently venting atmo and flames into space, I suspect I'm in a bit of trouble. It's the worst kind of trouble; I can't solve it with fast-talk or gratuitous violence.
       I don't know why I get into these messes.
       It's not that I haven't got a choice. Granted, many if not most agents of the KP don't reach a retirement age, but there isn't actually any rule against retiring, and I've certainly put in my years. Expensive and fortunately expendable technology has kept my body running long past any sensible expectation and I certainly don't feel as old as I would be if I was still wholly organic, so even if I'd be retiring young it'd be a well-earned one. Heck, thanks to my ridiculously large paycheck, possibly supplemented by the occasional misplaced piece of expensive evidence, if I retired tommorow I'd never have to work again a day in my life even if I did indulge my purely academic interest in irrationally expensive drinks. Of course, at the moment I may not have a tommorow, or if I do, it will be a very warm and short one, but the point stands. I don't *have* to be risking my very valuable life doing the quite frankly ridiculous things the KP asks of me.
       And yet, I do. I sometimes wonder if they've ever slipped a behaviour modification chip into my head along with my on-board computers. I assume they haven't because I'm still capable of wondering about it and most of my superiors are not subtle people.
       I'm really in it for the money, I suppose. I mean sure, I throw myself into harm's way for a living, usually literally, but if the political scientists are right and material income can be inversely correlated with good sense, then I fit right on the curve. I'm well-paid for my troubles. I couldn't buy a small moon with my savings, but I could certainly find a nice estate to live on and retire there until my batteries ran down. Yep, no question, it's all about the money.
       Okay, I'll reluctantly admit that maybe some small part of me also enjoys the adventure. I suppose I have had all kinds of experiences most people could only imagine. Granted, most of those experiences were aversive and horrifying, and I dare say that I have been swallowed by at least four large animals more than anybody should have to be. On the other hand, here I am in spacewalk, feeling the emptiness of space against what may as well be my "bare skin." Even if this is my last experience, it's a moderately amazing one.
       Hmm... that looks like of like a shuttlecraft over there. I wonder which fleet it's from.
       So, the money, the adventure... also the health plan, I guess. I'm sure that sounds odd given the extreme ill-health associated with my job, but when I'm in fit and fighting shape, which is the vast majority of the time, I can walk through blasterfire, lift small vehicles and punch through concrete. I was a pretty strong guy before the KP started work on me, but no human anywhere can do the stuff I can do, and that's worth losing a few limbs now and again... especially when they're modular and easily replaced. Granted, my armour won't stand up to, say, the heat of re-entry or hitting a medium-sized planet at terminal velocity (especially if I land on something hard), but other than that, it's kind of neat being about to see in four different visual spectrums.
       Looks like it's flying over towards me. Good for it.
       Wealth? I've already got that, I guess. I mean, it's always nice to have *more* but like I said, I could retire at any time. The adventures are interesting, but most people are happy just going on vacations. As for physical abilities, this body is mine to keep, KP or no, as long as I don't start using it to rob banks or something. I guess when you get down to it, the reason I'm slowly sinking into this planet's exosphere as opposed to sitting at home is because some part of me... some small, fairly unimportant part, I promise you... really cares about the work I do. There must be some small, abberant, evolutionary counter-adaptive part of my brain which believes that the Empire is bigger and more important than I am and that it needs to be protected, and that sometimes the preservation of society requires the unpreservation of capable individuals. I'm not saying I'm willing to die so that others might live, but I guess maybe I'm willing to accept the risk of dying to serve others. I don't know why, since by and large others aren't wonderful people, but something about putting enough of them together maybe makes them worth defending. A little bit, anyway. I'll lie about it under oath if I have to if anybody ever asks me about it.
       You know, I think it is an Imperial shuttle, after all. How about that. So long, ionosphere... you almost got me that time! Of course, when they pick me up they'll probably just ship me over to some area of the battle where I can be sent single-handedly onto a hostile starship or something else equally improbable and suicidal, and I doubt they'll so much as offer me a warm cup of tea en route, but that's why they pay me the big money.
       I hate my job, you know. But I do it anyway.

Neyrr Jesond, Somewhere in the Underdark, talking to himself
The Year 1 of the Second Reign of Gun'Mora

In the months since I began my new incarnation in this body, the third I have worn in my long, long life, I have been struck by how much my behaviour has been modified by the thoughts and memories of this body. I am Gun'Mora; I dominate, because this is what Gun'Mora must do to be Gun'Mora, and yet I know that my mind is different in this body from what it was in my previous two. In truth, I no longer even recall what it was like to live in my first body, having abandoned it more than twenty five thousand years ago. It was a small, human thing, pink and soft, weak and delicate. Yet, in what few memories I have of those early days of my life, I recall that I did not act the same as I did in my second body. In my first incarnation, I was a calm and careful man. I was raised to believe that I was divine, and rightly so, but I recall that even so, I did not possess then the arrogance that I did in my second incarnation. My second body was that of a demon, a Great Unclean One, and though the priests told me I transformed into it I have since come to believe that they likely captured the demon and transferred my mind into it. This would be consistent with my theory, for in the Great Unclean One's body I was far more powerful but also far more unstable. Ageless and nigh-invincible, I could be forgiven for believing I had become the god that the priests raised me to believe I was. In the body of that mad thing, I, too, was mad, though I dare say that my millenia of imprisonment did more to unhinge my mind than changing bodies. It was only when I came into posession of my third body, this fine and ever more interesting specimen, that I noticed how much I was changing. This mortal's thoughts and memories were but an eyeblink in the face of my own long life's experience, but his intellect and education was far beyond mine and using his brain for my own I had many thoughts I had never had before. My sanity was returned to me, and with it, much of my power. Gun'Mora the Mad God was a danger to the whole of this world, but Gun'Mora the Sane God is a danger to the whole of the multiverse. For I am Gun'Mora; I shall conquer and rule, because this is what Gun'Mora does. And indeed, so too is it what Neyrr Jesond did.

A thought, now, that neither Neyrr nor Gun'Mora might ever have had on their own. "Herein is the essential difference between the thief and the merchant: a good thief will never take a man's last coin." Mark this well, for it is the word of Gun'Mora. The purpose of the merchant is to aquire wealth, and the secondary purpose of the merchant is to contribute to his customer's wealth, though not with his own coin. The foolish merchant sells foolishly and makes little coin. The clever merchant finds ways, not to sell, but to make the customer wish to buy. When a merchant seeks to sell, he is dependent on what the customer wishes to spend. When the crafty merchant makes the customer want to buy, need to buy, then the customer is at the merchant's mercy. The merchant may take every coin the customer has and commit the customer to pay coins he has not yet earned. Of such things, dynasties are crafted. Contrast this with the thief. The thief is dependent not on the victims's wishes, but by what the victim possesses at this time. The thief can never take more than the victim has, and if the thief returns night after night, the rewards are less each night, and the risks greater. The foolish thief will thus lay claim to all the coin the victim has, and return for coins the victim has not yet earned, but will never suceed as does the clever merchant. The clever thief will not take a man's last coin, because a victim needs their last coin to find a place to stay, to replace stolen merchandise, to return home where they keep their coins, to aquire more coins. The thief my return to rob the same man twice, but never close together and never twice in a row. The merchant and the thief both take a man's coin, but the principle difference between then is this: a clever thief will never take a man's last coin, but a merchant has no such limitation.

In my first body, I took no coins, for I had no power. In my second body, I took a man's last coin, the last coin from every man in my kingdom, and so when no one had more coins they rose against me and toppled my throne. Now, Gun'Mora is risen from his dark prison and has outlived his enemies by twenty and five thousand years. In my third body, I shall be the merchant. I can make the world come to me and demand that I allow them to give me their last coin, and when they have no coins left, when they are empty and drained, they shall come to me and beg me to give them work and home and love, and they shall earn more coins to give unto me. For mighty is Gun'Mora and wise is Gun'Mora, but none is so wise that he cannot afford to learn a lesson and become better. I shall take what I desire, and as each supplicant begs me to take from him his wealth, his life, his soul, he shall do so with the certainty that he is, as Neyrr Jesond might once have said, coming out ahead on the deal. And Gun'Mora shall laugh, long and loud and for all eternity.

For I am Gun'Mora, the Deathless, God of Plague, Lord of Merchants, and all that you have is mine, waiting only to change hands.

Sebastian Pran-Dar, in conversation with Arbu the Talented, professional chronicler
Galanil 23rd, 2313 (Gerhyden Calendar), slightly after suppertime (but before the fifth round of mead)

So, my friend, you have paid for the drinks, and I promised I would answer your silly question, yes? You asked me, I think, why I am an adventurer... no, do not shake your head, it *is* a very silly question. First, allow me to say that I hate this word you use, "adventurer." Your common tongue is terribly unpoetic compared to the language of my people, but even so, this word stands out as crude and unpalatable. No, I did not say that it is innacurate, only that it is crude. It is quite accurate. I earn my keep taking on odd jobs and doing crazy things for those who are too intelligent to do the crazy things they pay me to do, and this is what adventurer means. I admit, it is one step better than being called a mercenary, yes? Though this too, I have been and will be again.

My people -- oh, from far North of here, you would never have heard of my village -- my people believe that we are all born with a natural inclination towards what we are meant to do in our lives. You have seen wolves, yes? The wolf is born with an instinct to hunt and kill, to band together with other wolves, to assert its dominance over those it can defeat and to obey those it cannot. These things, it is born knowing. Humans are among the few living things in this world that are not born knowing what to do with themselves, and this I think is why they walk in circles and look terribly confused so much of the time. But I am not being clear. We believe that humans are born with the skills at which they are meant to excel in their lives, as is the wolf and the bear and the goblin, but what makes humans different and... comical, this is a word in your tongue, yes? What makes them different and comical is that they are not born knowing that they have these skills, and so they must try a multitude of professions before they discover the one at which they will excel as well as the wolf can hunt the deer. Many humans never find what skill they are meant to master, which is why so many humans are unhappy in addition to confused. Above all, my people say, when you find that at which you excel and at which you might become a master, seize it! Latch on with your jaws -- so to speak -- and refuse to let go until it is your entirely. If you pick up a quill for the first time in your life and you know you are meant to write with it, do so! If you pick up a brick and know that you were born to splut on mortar and stick it to another brick, then do this, and do not try to become a poet or a soldier or a cooper instead. A wolf that decides to give up being a wolf will only ever be a poor wolf, and will never become a good bear. Although I have seen a wolf which had learned to walk on its hind legs and beg for treats from humans, but even if this is the skill which it was born to master then perhaps some skills make you look far too stupid to be the ones you are truly meant to. Or something. Feh.

You are actually taking all of this down? Who will want to read it? No, please yourself... if this is the skill which you were born to do, who am I to tell you to stop writing. No, actually, stop writing for a moment and order more mead, or my throat my be too parched to continue, and then you may resume writing. Sometimes we must take short breaks from the things we were meant to do, yes? Good, good. Heh. Where was I? Ah, of course.

Many of your people here believe that up North, where I come from, the land is filled only with barbarians. There is some truth to this... a hard land forges hard people who do what they must to survive. You might say that my people have much in common with the animals, the bears and the wolves, though you see, I drink fine mead instead of beer and I wear pants instead of leaves, so my people must have some culture. Even among our villages where half the year we go out to hunt and fresh snow muffles our footsteps, we are not all warriors. We have our coopers, for how else would we store our mead? We have our scribes, for how else would we record our great tales? But we have also our men and women who know almost from birth that what they are meant to do is to go out and hunt. I am one of these. From my earliest days, I was a hunter. I stalked the other children through the tall grasses around our village and I brought back much meat for our feasts. When the time came for me to choose my profession I might have been welcomed by many to apprentice with them, but the calling of my heart and soul was to hunt. It is what I am good at. It is what I love. This is why I am, as you say, an adventurer. I fulfill the mad quests of others' because it is what I was born to do and it is what I have mastered. I throw myself into danger for profit -- heh, and for fun! -- because it is what I am best at in this life, and it is a most foolish animal who fights its own nature. And if I can have mighty prey, protect the innocent, and earn money to fill my belly with mead all at the same time, then my nature is a most pleasant and fortuitous one, yes?