The Scroll of Exalted Ponies

The secret cellar hideout of Judge Paragraph Rider’s wife Ice Lotus had been hidden at the end of a filthy back alley, that apparently mostly saw use as the toilet of the neighborhood’s homeless. Sunrise opted to be the lookout at the entrance to the alley.

“Well that’s one way to keep prying eyes… and noses… away – you ok Shimmer?” Speaker asked sympathetically.

Still retching from the vile stench of salty turds, Shimmer tried to reign in her urge to puke as her sense of smell slowly scaled back to its normal level, the charm she had been using to enhance that sense being not the fastest thing to terminate: “I’ll… hurp... live”
Down in the cellar Speaker found Sullen Hoof looking at several framed documents hanging on the walls.

“What’ve you got there?” Speaker asked, skimming through the old realm pictoglyphs written on the framed documents.

They were love letters… of a sort. The framed letters were penned in beautiful old realm, using a style that Speaker insisted was particularly artful and often used in the first age to give old realm glyphs erotic undertones, signed by someone called “The Lover Clad In The Raiment Of Tears”
“You think it’s another Deathknight? The title sounds like one” Speaker wondered.

Sullen Hoof shook his head: “No, that’s another Deathlord. She operates up here north… though rumor back in Stygia was that she was staying well away from the Bull and his operations - she's more into seducing and corrupting ponies not picking fights with Dawn caste Solars”
Reading the rather lurid love-letters, which was far more steamy than the stuff ‘Ice Lotus’ – probably not her real name – had sent to Bridge Water, it was clear that whoever the recipient of the letter really was, that she was under implied orders to bring ruin to the saltspire league.

“Hey check this out” Cash called, standing near a pile of crumpled up paper that almost reached the damn ceiling. The first few feet worth of crumbled up papers at the bottom were basically rotted into moldy lumps of goo, but the rest was still legible for the most part.

Between Sully, Speaker and Cash’s combined shuffling through the pile, the three quickly managed to a number of interesting letters – or rather, drafts of letters.

“I got some here that look like they’re written from another saltspire principality. It’s for one of the city officials who left the city… offered him a good deal of money if he’d leave the city and come service this other lord” Cash said, not sounding surprised at all.

The one Speaker was looking at was written in old realm, addressed to the Deathlord, going on about the Deathknight’s scheme in the city: “It’s dated about four months ago, says she found a perfect family of dupes to live with, ‘replaced’ the wife, and get this: "…once I have gotten them to kill each other via this chump I am going to spring from prison eventually, I plan on approaching the Solar ruling the city. He is about as clueless and inept as it gets, and as the wise widow of a judge I’ll offer him my advice and my body. Once I’m done with him he’ll make a nice new addition to our ranks – he will love you as much as I do oh mistress”

“New additions to their ranks? What, do they think they can trick a Solar to swear fealty to a Deathlord?” Sullen Hoof deadpanned, finding the idea utterly ridiculously.

Speaker shook his head slowly in grim despair. It was a rather grim epiphany that the letter had sparked within his mind: “No… it’s because the black exaltations of the Deathlords are somehow corrupted Solar exaltations”
Neither Sully nor Cash found this revelation very pleasant.

“Good grief… but… how? Are you sure that they’re not just trying to flip Raneth? Considering his behavior I could easily imagine him turning against the Bull if pushed in the right direction” Cash suggested, clearly not wanting Speaker’s statement to be true.

Reminding Cash and Sully of their Deathknight acquaintance the Bodhisattva, Speaker noted that last they had seen him he had been able to will forth his caste mark in such a way that it looked less like a bleeding wound, and more like a… blood-covered golden mark, with light trying to shine out from it… it all made sense… terrible, horrible, sense… though how was a mystery shrouded in the darkness of the underworld.
“You think Lytek knows this?” Sullen Hoof asked Speaker, looking just as quizzical as he looked melty.

Tapping an old dried-out blood-stain on the floor as he though, Speaker nodded: “It would make sense if he did, would explain why he wanted us to catch him some Deathknights to examine…”

“Why wouldn’t he have told us this? Warned us? I mean, if any of us got captured... could they turn a live Solar into a Deathknight?” Cash worried.

The three agreed that this would require further investigation – later – and while warning Raneth and the Bull never to let themselves get captured by the Deathlords right now would be ok, then telling the full details might not be…

“I actually think it would be ok to tell the Bull – and we’ll need to confer with Heath Rose as well” Cash argued, saying that the Bull had always seemed level-headed not to do anything to rash – Raneth on the other hoof…

Investigating the place further, Speaker and Shimmer found essence-traces of necromantic magic emanating from the fresh but sundered remains of a zombified icewalker – it felt strange to creation, and the way that the remains were scattered around made it look as if it had been part of a kind of flesh-ringed portal. Either way it was very clear that Ice Lotus, probably not her real name in any way, had gotten away – for her scent led to the basement and then… nowhere.

Calling in Icewalkers to secure the place, and hiring a few local scribe who could just enough old realm to help sort and index all the letter drafts, the circle left to inform Judge Paragraph Rider and his daughter of the news.

…they didn’t take it well. Ice Lotus had never had enlightened essence, so it was obvious that this deathknight had replaced and impersonated her for quite a while. The oldest letters the circle had found were around five months old, hinting that the swap had happened around then.
“I have several contacts in the underworld” Sullen Hoof said from under his golden helmet: “…I will ask for information on her, as well as put a reward out for her head – she will not get away with this, I promise you”

While having little to offer the judge and her daughter, Sunrise ensured that when the circle left that the two were in good spirits and had open minds ready for reconciliation between the two. Cash also aired his idea of setting up a new judicial system with Paragraph Rider as a new Chief Justice, so Raneth never has to judge another case. Sure, new judges would be needed, but with the revelation from the deathknight’s lair that many of the city’s old judges and other civil servants had been lured away on false pretenses, then if Raneth would allow such ponies to return and resume their old jobs without punishment then much of that could be solved fairly quickly and without the circle needing to do that much.

Raneth was – after a bit of cajoling from Cash – tempted to agree with all of this. Cash pointed out that by letting some of the city’s old administration come back and resume its work, then Raneth could focus all the more on his secret project… which honestly wouldn’t remain that secret once the entire city started working on it.

King Raneth, with all of his impotent and seething rage, was oddly unhappy with the idea that his super secret project couldn’t remain so…
“In the first age most Twilight caste Solars would have a private factory cathedral or atelier manse to help with stuff like that – but if you want to produce enough weapons to arm the Bull’s icewalker legions, then doing it all on your own just won’t cut it - be realistic” Speaker noted, feeling almost guilty that he didn’t really know how to make advanced manse designs like that…

It was painfully obvious that Raneth, for all his ambitions as a craftspony and how much he liked being in charge, that he couldn’t come up with anything remotely better. Of course, what then became a source of aggravation for him was that the circle wasn’t entirely keen on staying in Plenilune for the required number of months needed to retool the entire city for arms production – plus it would no doubt take time to fix the saltspire. Well, that was the circle’s position until Speaker noted that Lookshy wouldn’t exactly be able to get ready in just under a week: “…so we do have some time – Shimmer, could you send a message to Risotto on what the legion’s status is, and what their schedule for readiness is?”

It was first the next day that the circle got a response: The Legion wasn’t even mobilizing yet – it was waiting for the salt situation to be resolved.

“Can we send them my recorder? I can show that salt is being loaded up and shipped out right now” Cash suggested.

Sullen Hoof noted that it would probably be easier if they could simply show that salt barges were going down the river of tears. Speaker agreed, noting that Lookshy no doubt that observation posts with heliographs along the north-western edges of the hundred kingdoms, so once the first barges are loaded and going it shouldn’t be long.

“Let’s see, barge going downriver, down the Yanaze…. That’s about one and a half month, but they won’t need to go all the way – so maybe a tad less than month before the Lookshy observers spot them and message their commanders?” Cash calculated, trying to calculate the usual how many times a salt barge would usually stop along the river of tears for provisions.

Nodding ever so slightly, Speaker furrowed his brows deeply: “Fair enough, and I can’t imagine that the legion will be able to marshal its forces in less than a few months… so that gives us a small season’s worth of time in total, at the very least – we won’t need more than a few weeks to get this place up and running”

This pleased Raneth and finally ended his foul mood, though he did point out that Speaker’s estimate on ‘getting Plenilune up and running’ didn’t seem to factor in fixing the saltspire: “…and didn’t you say that you would need to do that in order to free up hooves to work in the arsenal?”

Speaker conceded that he hadn’t factored in fixing the manse – mainly because he didn’t really know how it was damaged – but said that he could get on that first thing in the morning.

“Great, you and Shimmer can have fun with that – I’ll poke around town to see about setting up workshops and foundries… ask around for local mines and timber production” Cash noted.

With a grin that was equal parts menacing and equal parts ‘Oh I am so pleased that you have deigned to help me you ungrateful swine’ Raneth agreed to this, turning to Sunrise to ask what she would be doing to contribute to his plans.

“With permission I would like to oversee you working in your workshop for the time being, until the others are done” Sunrise calmly noted, not looking up from her by now lukewarm bowl of soup.

Standing up with a furious expression, Raneth shouted: “What? Never! I tolerate no disruptions when working!”

Her brilliant golden castemark lightning up, it’s simple disk-form shining clearly through Sunrise’s hood as if it wasn’t there, Sunrise calmly noted: “I can assure you, I will be no distraction to you – in fact, I think you will enjoy having a fellow chosen of Celestia to bounce ideas back and forth with in attendance"

A battle of conflicting thoughts seemed to play out in Raneth’s mind as his face alternated back and forth between an expression of being pleased and offended somehow – ultimately it settled on a mildly content one: “So be it…”

Speaker briefly wondered where Sullen Hoof was, but recalled that Sully had said that he would be stalking around Plenilune looking for Ice Lotus – he had apparently picked up a few things about tracking Deathknights in the underworld, even though Shimmer had given up on the grounds that Ice Lotus had evidently veiled her scent beyond Shimmer’s supernatural tracking charm’s abilities to sniff her out.

The next day Shimmer and Speaker got a tour of the saltspire by a palace servant who spoke Seatongue, albeit poorly – but well enough that Shimmer was to ask the old mare questions and translate to Speaker.

“Ok see these paintings? This is the line of kings and queens that have ruled here… she says that they’ve been doing that for hundreds of years, but… damn, they don’t even look like ponies anymore” Shimmer noted, as the three of them walked down a spiraling hallway that ran all the way up the outer wall of the saltspire.

It was a tad strange to Shimmer that the paintings of kings that had been defeated hadn’t been taken down, new conquerors simply putting up their painting next in the line – usually with even more heavily gem encrusted golden picture frames – but as the servant explained, then in the north pretty much everyone respected the dead, even if one had caused their deaths: “…we have a saying: You never know what corpses might thaw in the summer”

Not entirely comforted by the grim saying, Speaker focused his attentions on the paintings. There was an undeniable patterns: A new ruler would come along, either through military conquest or some other way of taking over the city, and that king or queen would look like a pony in the portrait – no surprise there.

But subsequent paintings, of their descendants, of their hers, revealed a pattern of degeneration… the kings and queen portraits began taking on frog-like features: Their coats would yield in patches ever increasing in size to what looked like moist skin, their snouts and mothers would change shape ever so slightly – the servant even claimed that it was living in the manse for generations that did stuff to you… though it also allowed them to breathe underwater.

“Is that why they built the castle structures around the saltspire base?” Speaker wondered.

Asking the servant and getting a reply, Shimmer said: “No, apparently they just wanted more castle – the first expansions were built centuries ago”

Mutations caused by generations of exposure to the warped essence flows of a malfunctioning manse – Speaker couldn’t claim that it was the worst side-effect he had ever seen from a manse that wasn’t working right – but at the same time it was clearly a very slow-acting effect, hinting that the damage to the manse wasn’t that great: He knew from the first age that most times when a was damaged it would either blow up, quite spectacularly, from essence buildup, or shut down and go inert due to lack of essence input.

With essence sight Speaker and Shimmer went to work, examining the vaulted arches, the dragon-icongraphy of inlaid jade, and all the other components of the manse’s inner workings – the essence filters, the black jade baffles and other strange contraptions that were meant to siphon salt out of water and condense it into giant crystal slabs.

To both of their surprise then everything seemed to be working just fine – the main problem was the salt-extraction parts of the manse simply weren’t being powered properly…

“See these inscriptions on the gems here?” Shimmer said to Speaker, their guide sitting in a corner of the damp basement room looking somewhat bored if not bemused.

Speaker took a quick peek at the gem. It had old realm glyphs on it clearly stating that the strange devices it was connected to were only meant to take in pure water essence…

“Look at how the thing is clogged with stone chips and… goo” Shimmer noted, poking her hoof into a pungent and thick slime that oozed out of the machine.

Essence sight revealed the issue: The essence coming into the device wasn’t pure water essence – of course, that meant tracking the source of that essence flow contamination.

This search led the two outside the saltspire, to the palacial addons around the base of the spire.

“Oh Raneth is not going to like this” Shimmer said dejectedly.

With a smile, Speaker asked: “You’ll keep us safe if he decides to run us out of town over this right?”

“Oh course my love” Shimmer mused, giving Speaker a kiss.

Raneth turned out to not just dislike what the two had to report – he was… annoyed. To Speaker and Shimmer’s great surprise the news that it was the castle structures around the saltspire themselves that were polluting the manse’s essence flows didn’t elicit any kind of outburst.

“Ok, so… what’s the solution? Alter the castle? I think they have some blue and black jade stashed in the treasury somewhere…” Raneth asked asked, sounding for once genuinely curious.

Sadly Speaker could only say that from his and Shimmer’s observations, then nothing short of the complete demolition and removal of the castle around the base of the saltspire would fix the saltspire. Even the bridge leading to the city on the shore would have to go.

“But don’t fret – you can sell this as a great gift of the ponies of Plenilune” Shimmer suggested.

This proposal caught both Speaker and Raneth’s attention, though for different reasons, while Cash just nodded in agreement: The basic gist was to sell the demolition of the palace and the restructuring of the city as a boon to the city: “We’ll simple tell them that their time as defacto salt-slaves are over. You’re offering everything new jobs as soon as the mines, woodcutting and ore smelting facilities are built – Speaker can handle their training. Combine that with saying that we’re tearing down the old castle because it’s a symbol of their old oppressors… they’ll love it, they'll love you”

In lieu of trying to complain or voice any concerns over this scheme, Raneth just threw his forehooves into the air and said that the circle was free to do as it had planned: “…but mark my words: If you fail and this brings ruin to the city, I will make sure that the Bull knows every detail”
“Dear, what did we agree to about passive aggressive threats?” Sunrise admonished, like a disappointed aunt correcting a wily nephew.

To the rest of the circle’s surprise Raneth almost recoiled in horror at Sunrise’s statement. He meekly nodded and left the room…
“What exactly have you been doing to him?” Cash wondered.

Sunrise merely shrugged and smiled: “Polite conversation, that’s all – discussing the virtues of polite society”

With a bemused look Cash chortled and nodded, amused with the idea that Sunrise was likely driving Raneth up the wall with polite but insistent suggestions that he improve his behavior.

Over the next few days Shimmer summoned multiple representatives from local and regional elemental courts. Asking politely, then less politely, then eating two of the representatives, Shimmer was ultimately told about all ore deposits in the region. Speaker equally spent his time evaluating the local timber industry, not that there was much: The few lumberponies in the city mainly supplied the shipwrights which only really did in barge-repair, and a few businesses that did in building houses. Cash equally scouted out several locations throughout the city that would be suitable for moving the city’s administration out to, away from the palace around the saltspire.

Another aspect of the city that would require much work was the shape of the city itself: Most buildings had built in ‘sails’ or nets on their roofs, to catch salt in the wind. Sure, it might be handy for the salt trade at the moment, but for the purpose of making room for ponies to live and expand it wasn’t particularly handy.

Sunrise and Cash devised a plan where various parts of the city would be emptied, demolished and rebuilt for Raneth’s new arsenals, lumber mills and iron works. At first the outer parts of the city would be uprooted, with the ponies there being housed in – of all places – a wing of the palace that had been cleared and made ready for them, until new housing had been built by Speaker with his singing staff.

The grand presentation of the plan went fairly well – Cash, being the only member of the circle who spoke the local tongue, presented it well and managed to sell pretty much every pony gathered in the grand central square of the city on the idea that ending their dependency on slaving away sweeping up salt. Apparently the idea of offering work in smithies, foundries, lumber yards and all the other industries that would comprise the planned weapon production industry sounded very nice – though Speaker missed the more complex parts where Cash elaborated on how the various new businesses, while initially state-owned, would be able to keep whatever profits they made from excess production and whatever else they could squeeze in, as long as they met their deadlines for the things they had to make for Raneth.

Apparently this was more or less the same setup that Cash had set up in Sunhill, though with the added incentive that the ponies working at most of the various small businesses that Cash had set up to keep the city running could buy themselves out, as a means to become entirely privately owned.

Following the grand speech many of the ponies in the outer parts of the city began packing their things – Cash had promised nice new homes… so Speaker was quickly sent out to sing up some apartment buildings with his staff.

At first Shimmer had to hold off the mob of ponies each trying to claim one of the new apartments long before Speaker had finished the building, let alone strengthen the walls and floors enough to hold the weight of ponies. Next up, once the ponies were let in, a numerous fights broke out as scraps started over who got to keep the apartments. Ultimately the ice-walkers that had come out to witness the miraculous construction had to clear the place, after which Cash organized a slightly more civil distribution of the new housing.

“Damnit these ponies… they’re squabbling over this like their lives depended on it” Shimmer complained, looking bruised and grumpy from all the rocks and other random bits of kit that had been thrown at her while she had been holding off the mob.

Cash shrugged as he checked his list of apartment-desiring families and single applicants, trying to tally them all so Speaker could be told exactly how many more apartment buildings would be needed: “It’s a combination of a lot of things – ponies up here in the north don’t seem afraid of speaking their mind, even against their rulers, plus a lot of them seem to have packed up their shacks entirely, so they basically have nowhere to sleep at the moment… and the nights up here are nothing if not cold enough to kill you”

Shimmer didn’t seem particularly impressed, but Cash followed up with noting that the ponies of Plenilune were still technically serfs who lived only at the whims of their ruler: “This is probably the first time in centuries they’ve been offered something nice that they had to claim through their own effort – the desperation to get a nicer place to live, mixed with this being the first time in their life where they don’t just have to do as they’re told… they’re overcompensating”

“Even western tribals know well enough not to rush in and riot over stuf like this – what if someone got hurt?” Shimmer grouched.

Cash gave his list one last look-over before rolling it up and floating it into a pocket inside his silk jacket: “Your age betrays you. The ponies here that live off gathering salt only live to around thirty to forty years… they don’t have the patience that your long life has afforded you”

By the end of the day Speaker had produced several more apartment buildings, though they all stood without doors and windows, but that was something which could be produced later.

It was also at that point that complaints that the new buildings were poorly optimized for salt collection began to come in, not that they were acted upon in any way.

Over the following few days the process was repeated, moving much of the city out of the more slummy parts of Plenilune, which cleared more than enough space for the arsenal workshops and warehouses to be built. At Raneth’s surprisingly polite request, Speaker put in a bit of extra effort to ensure that the buildings meant to house actual arms production were a bit sturdier than the rest – though Raneth also complimented Speaker on the ingenious use of trapped pockets of air in the stone walls to isolate the new buildings, especially the foundry, which would cut down on how much coal would needed to keep things hot and molten.

The second last part of the reconstruction effort was Raneth’s new palace – which closely preceded the final step, the demolition of the old saltspire palace. The old palace was gutted of anything and everything that Raneth wanted in his new abode, though Speaker noted that he would only create the overall structure of the new palace: Raneth would either have to hire local craftsponies or do the final decorations himself.

“I’m impressed… he didn’t even raise his voice when I told him that” Speaker said in astonishment.

Cash didn’t appear nearly as impressed: “Sunrise is really having a good effect on him, gotta say I’m impressed with her work”

The demolition of the old palace happened to great fanfare and public jubilation. The symbol of their oppressors crumbling away under Speaker’s disassembly charm, with finally the bridge out to the saltspire giving way, which was celebrated across the city.

The next day quite a lot of ponies across the city woke up to new hangovers and new jobs, as assigned and distributed by Cash based on their previous work and some basic aptitude testing that he had evidently conducted while Speaker and Shimmer had spent days tearing down the old palace.

At one of the mining camps set up based on the information that Shimmer had gotten from local elementals, Cash addressed the ponies gathered there: “Come good ponies – it is time to strike the earth! No longer will your income be based on the whims of the wind and how lucky you are with a brush. Now you stand to profit and prosper purely on your determination and your strength, taking the bounties of the depths and selling that to the city’s new copper foundry on East Sturgeon’s lane”

“But the foundry isn’t ready yet – and none of us have ever worked mining ponies” one concerned voice rang out. A murmur of other voices chimed in with concerned tones.

Cash beamed – the fact that the ponies before him complained about this meant that he could give them even more good news: “Fear not – for now that the saltspire is working properly again, its cranking out so much salt that Lord Raneth will still be paying out your wages for the time being – so consider this your training period for this work”

An old mare with a whole new set of teeth, courtesy of Speaker’s miraculous medical charms, stepped up. Cash introduced her as the new boss of the mining operation. She had been an old retired mining pony living in Plenilune with her family, but thanks to a generous offer from Cash and some medical treatment from Speaker she had agreed to helm the mining operation. A few other retired miners, as well as two that had been simply traveling through Plenilune at the time, had similarly been hired on to help in exchange for generous wages.

All in all the rollout of the city’s new industry went reasonably smooth. A group of fire elementals found the steel foundry that Speaker had made quite cozy and had to be accommodated for, a few panicky riots caused by doomsayers who couldn’t imagine how one could live outside of collecting salt had to be quelled, and the saltspire’s salt block extruders had to be cleaned throughly before they started working properly – but when they finally worked they indeed began cranking out talent-sized blocks of solid salt crystal to the point that it actually became a bit of an issue to move salt-barges in and out of the loading docks quickly enough to keep up with the magical production.

Raneth, grumpy but satisfied that it would take at least a couple of months before everyone had been fully trained for their new jobs and raw materials would start to flow into the foundries, lumber mills and the arsenal, thanked the circle – privately – though he did note that with this massive increase in salt production, the remaining saltspire league city states would no doubt declare war on him out of fear of going out of business.

“Will be the Bull be able to send you reinforcements in time?” Cash asked, not really wanting to see all his work wasted at the tip of the spears of greedy salt-kings.

“He better” Raneth scowled.

As the circle packed up Nah and made ready to leave, Speaker and Shimmer wondered why Raneth was suddenly acting so ornery again.

“…and he was just starting to act so nice, but now this” Speaker lamented as he looked skywards. He was ready to accept that Raneth was just a massive tool, but still… it annoyed him.

Shimmer half-shrugged: “He’s probably just saddlesore that Sunrise is leaving with us – Raneth and her were getting on so well”

It was then that Cash arrived along with a dozen ponies hauling a massive cart on which a huge braided steel cable was laid out. Apparently then Cash had gotten the bright idea of speeding up Lookshy’s committal to war by using the jade-steel cable and Nah to haul three barges full of the giant salt bricks down to Lookshy.

“…and did the captains of the barges agree to this?” Shimmer wondered.

Cash smiled gleefully – explaining that the owners of the barges had left the city long ago when the barges had originally been sunk: “These are ours now – they’ll be taking salt to Sunhill as a regular route once we’ve swung by Lookshy with them”

Hooking up the jade-steel cable to Nah in such a way that it wouldn’t hurt the giant beast, and then figuring out a way to haul three barges without lifting any of them out of the water, wasn’t easy – but it was accomplished, resulting in the decidedly strangely sight of a flying yeddim rocketing down the river of tears, with three barges in tow which each sent up a massive spray in their wake. Oh what must the poor ponies living and fishing along the river not have thought…

Signaling the Lookshy harbor citadel by having Sunrise flare her anima as they approached Lookshy in the late twilight hour two days after leaving Plenilune, the circle was welcome back to the city with much wonderment. The talent-sized salt bricks were examined closely, and the crews of the barges told the wondrous tale of how the circle had ended Plenilune’s salt serfdom by helping the locals find ore deposits and set up lumber mills and foundries. The weapon manufacturing was not mentioned, per a polite charm-enforced request of Cash, though the circle had no doubt that Lookshy would learn of that at some point.

In a large meeting room in a well fortified structure within the Legion district of Lookshy, the circle was finally told what they wanted to hear from Taimyo Karal Linseed: “The speed at which you resolve these issues are giving the boffins over at the Operations directorate everything from headaches to wet dreams – they can barely keep up with what you keep pulling off. That said, then the martial staff’s promise stands: You’ve secured us enough salt to last us a decade – or at least one campaign into the underworld – so tomorrow I will start sending out marching orders to recall troops to the city. Congratulations, Lookshy is now marshaling for offensive operations on your behalf”
“When do you expect everything to be ready? Speaker wondered.

Linseed smirked: “Everything? Never, but I expect Operations to give me a time-line for the proposed campaign within the next two weeks. I’m guessing we’ll have enough troops marshaled by the late end of Descending Wood to make the initial incursions through the morning fields. Given how close Deep Rot is to Lookshy in the underworld, that’ll give us a wide window to attack and destroy the place before calibration”
There were a few other details – such as the fact that Linseed heavily expected most of Ops’ plan proposals to involve Speaker helping fix all kinds of otherwise mothballed and retired magical weapons, and the planning required for the Lookshyan Games that were to cover for the buildup of troops in the city, but these seemed like minor concerns at the moment…