Dear Diary,

Some days, when you least expect it, when you're not looking for it, everything goes exactly right.

So by the end of class yesterday we had a complete Order of Battle, or at least as close as we'd be able to get given the communications technology available, not to mention the general fucked up organization in Norfolk.

Five Hundred Phileo Heroes, although only four hundred fifty would be heading to Calverton. The remaining fifty would be set to patrolling our five other cities, each with five Senior Cadets to back them up.

Sixteen thousand, seven hundred Phileo Volunteers currently on the roster, but thirteen thousand five hundred would be staying in Alliance territory attached to the home guard Heroes and Senior Cadets. That gave them each three units of fifteen. While even forty five Volunteers wouldn't add much fighting power to a full fledged Phileo Hero, we didn't expect any real 'fighting'. Mostly police work and pest control, and a trained unit of Phileo Volunteers could shut down a bar brawl or defend themselves against a bear or pack of wolves better than civilians at least. That meant we'd have thirty two hundred Phileo Volunteers with us. That included all of the Dragonslayers. We also were bringing all of the available Crossbows and bolts. That meant half of our Volunteers had Crossbows, which meant we had some extra if we kept them rotating one on, two off the way we intended.

The simple reason we hadn't built any more Crossbows; the Academy's Smiths, who'd been the ones building most of the Crossbows, had transitioned entirely over to re-forging the Cold Iron armor, shields, and weapons formerly belonging to the Calverton Heroes into simple Cold Iron chain Shirts. Originally we'd only intended to reforge the shit the Rogues had worn and carried, but General Hargreaves put his foot down and straight up confiscated every goddamn piece of Cold Iron Calverton had brought along. I'm technically not privy to the information, but most of the Cold Iron in Phileo went to the same cause as well; simple chain shirts not only for most of Calverton's Heroes, but also for each of their Soldiers.

Twenty five hundred of them; all that remained of Calverton's army. Apparently their army had always been smaller than Phileo's, what with Calverton barely being the size of Camden Yards, but they'd still had ten thousand before the Plague hit them. I'm not sure if soldiers survived better, or if a lot of the non-military survivors signed up, but either way, none of those twenty five hundred would likely back down or take a break, so having them able to deal with the Undead Miasma was super important. With fuckin' Arse High Priest Garland turning the coats of so many of their former Heroes, not to mention killing a bunch more by being a goddamn Typhoid Mary, Calverton wound up having only about a hundred Heroes left. Eighty five basic Fighter types, fifteen Magi, who would be worth their weight in gold once Smite went Global and they could chain cast that shit until they ran out of Mana. Only five Heroic Clergy survived out of all of Calverton.

Fuckin' Garland.

New Amsterdam wasn't in much better shape, especially Hero wise. Only a hundred of them survived me in any condition to ever do Hero work again. Forty five Fighter types. Twenty five Clergy following a mix of Deities; all but one High Priestess of Athena and a couple Priests of Thor and Tyr followed Dan Gods. Twenty Magi, all of whom had been Soul burned by my final action at the Battle of the Walls, which meant they wouldn't have nearly the endurance the other Magi would. Ten 'Fighter-Magi', New Amsterdam's attempt to answer Phileo's Heroes. In terms of troops, they weren't much better off. They had three thousand Levies willing to let themselves be forced into uniform. The New Amsterdam Heroes and Troops were all headed to Calverton through some kind of political maneuvering to let them 'win Glory liberating Calverton' while folks from Phileo stayed home to keep the peace.

I wasn't sure how to feel about that. I figured if anybody deserved to call it a day, it was folks I'd happened to. Y'know, in a near fatal bad way, not in a sweaty happy way. Which might be near fatal for somebody not rocking Divine Attributes at this point, I dunno. I guess I might find out after all this shit settled down. I had a date pending with Siobhan, after all.

Finally, Norfolk. Two hundred Jarls or Jarl equivalents. Guys I would put money on surviving a fistfight with a Phileo Hero; some of them might even win, depending on relative inebriation. According to Olga, who'd dropped me the info when I asked her near the end of the day, every Jotnar capable of wielding a weapon, which meant about half of the Jotnar living in Norfolk, followed the two thousand Trolls I'd sent to make sure the Undead didn't have some kind of shit waiting for us in the water outside the docks. Numbers wise, that was like two hundred Jotnar who ranged in height from a few big hundred foot plus tall fuckers like Olaf to the bulk of them who were somewhere in the thirty to forty foot tall range. Even the 'short' ones, who were Loki sized, would be able to wade through most of the Bay if they had to. More likely they'd just go up the west coast of the Bay, maybe ranging out into the water when the Trolls needed them for backup. Also, not to put to fine a point on it, convincing the folks in Rich Man's Port to keep their asses up the James for the duration.

Three thousand Norfolk Warrior Karls and five thousand Thralls rounded out our order of battle. I didn't expect either group to be super effective at killing Undead, but if all they did was keep the Zombies at bay to give our Heroes a safe-ish place to sleep and eat, I say the Thralls would be earning their new homes several times over. The Warriors... I realized I hadn't been kidding when I called them cannon fodder. Most of them still had the 'plan' of grabbing enough loot to maybe found their own Jarldom on the outskirts of Norfolk. Not exactly the most altruistic of reasons. Not even particularly generous or noble, and even if they did manage it, they sure as fuck wouldn't be getting the whole 'rape and murder' privilege of pre me Jarls.

So all told we had eleven hundred Hero types, sixteen thousand troops of varying quality, and two thousand Trolls, who slotted into the role of 'Marines' pretty well, what with their amphibious assault capability. All up against somewhere over ninety thousand Undead who had home field advantage.

After another night of chibi chef shrimp fest, I went to class ready to maybe balance that Home Field Advantage a little bit.

After a breakfast of her corncake, my corncake slathered in so much syrup it counted more as sweet corn soup, and even bits of corn cake Menace flipped at her Mom, we trooped up to the Advanced Mana Shaping classroom. While I wandered back to my normal spot in the back of the room, Saffron went up and spoke quietly with Doc Roberts. I swear if his face lit up any more, he'd have rivaled the fuckin' Ley Lines outside. After that she walked quietly back to join me. "Are you ready, love?"

I smiled easily at her, taking her hand and giving it a squeeze. "How much Mana will you need?"

She sighed. "Quite a bit more than last time, I'm afraid."

That surprised me. "Uh, I get that Smite is based on Revive, and Revive is stupid Mana intense, but didn't you guys pare it back to bare bones?"

She nodded. "We did, and for just that reason, to make it less expensive. On the other hand, the version I'm establishing Globally is going to include a portion that pulls power from the Global Spell Network in order to minimize the Mana needs of the Caster. Of course, that part will work least well in an established Undead Miasma, but there's no reason to leave some poor hedge Priest out in the middle of nowhere in the lurch when he's trying to stop a Miasma from forming in the first place. Finally, last time I replaced an existing Global Spell. The Shape I used unmade the previous versions, harvested their Mana, and used it to establish the new Assess Health. This time there's no older version of the Spell to do that with."

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I thought about that for a second. "I think I know what to do."

Of course you do, My Goddess.

When do you want to start?

"Doctor Roberts has asked that we wait until the class has all arrived to observe."

"Observe what?"

I took a deep, centering breath, then turned with a big old fake smile. "Good Morning, Cadet Smith! Ready to learn today?"

She shrugged. "I'd hoped perhaps to get Archmage Aetos' opinions on mobile Mana Wards."

"Aetos-Diaz," my Kitten hissed. "I will be willing to entertain questions when my own work is done today."

Smith blinked. "Your own work? But... what remains for you to do? You've... you've not only created a vastly improved version of Assess Health, you've established it as a Global Spell." She paused, then shook her head. "I suppose you could be demonstrating Smite, but..." Then she stopped her mouth open. "Really?"

Kitten just smiled. Before Karen could say anything else, I held up one finger. "You get one more question before Saffron needs to start prepping. Save the rest for after."

To her credit, she stood there, mouth working, obviously discarding questions while the rest of the class trickled into the room. Finally she settled on, "will active Divinations have a negative impact on your Shaping?"

Saffron nodded. "I'm sorry to say they might. If you'd like to establish a passive Divination, please do so now, but only if you can maintain it throughout the process."

"How long will that be?"

"I suspect no more than an hour. Likely substantially shorter; it depends entirely on how fast Tabitha can provide me Mana and how quickly I can manipulate it." She then turned to the rest of the class. "That goes for the rest of you. Passive Divinations only, establish them now, and maintain them until I have completed my Shaping." With that she made a Shape I recognized as similar to the illusion she'd put up on the feast table at Bonnie and Larry's wedding, and a black, glowing, six and zero appeared in midair in front of her.

"What's happening?" muttered one of the slower kids, which in Advanced Mana Shaping didn't equate to 'actually slow', just 'not paying attention'.

"Archmage Aetos-Diaz is about to establish her second Global Spell. Smite. One we've worked on in Advanced Healing Studies," snapped Smith.

The clueless wonder asked, "Smite? How is something called 'Smite' a Healing Spell?"

"It corrects the twisting of Soul that makes Undead what they are. Now cast your Divination if you're going to, or just sit down, shut up, and observe."

Weird how much less Smith's bitch-mode annoyed me when it wound up arrayed in defense of my Kitten's efforts. The timer ticked down to fifteen, and I said, "Okay, Kitten, I'm gonna start getting ready." I Co-Located to M-Space. My wireframe view of the room included writhing tentacles outside the windows for a moment until the windows themselves collapsed inward.

Doc Roberts flinched, "Archmage! The room's shielding has collapsed! We..."

"Do shut up, Doctor." Fuzzy darkness flickered through the room with Saffron's words, and if the whites of Doc's eyes got bigger, he shut his mouth and froze.

In M-Space, warm, fuzzy, writhing tentacles surrounded me, supported me, empowered me.

I dropped the Blend on my M-Space me and pulled Mana direct from Mimic. It flowed into that me, through the me standing with one Stabilizing hand on Saffron's shoulder, and into the Shape she wove in front of her.

I recognized part of the core of it from the endless class discussions on Sundays. The part of me that could play guitar conferred with some other, deeper part of me, and judged that Shape absolutely would wreck the shit out of any Undead it hit. Short range, basically no further than an Undead's personal Mana Absorbing Aura. Which meant it would be able to tag stronger Undead from further out. Power intensive, especially against those more powerful Undead, but then they'd drain the Mana out of somebody anyhow, at least this way it would wind up hurting them instead of feeding them.

Layer after layer of Mana wrapped around it. I kind of thought I recognized some parts of it. Something that looked like Divination, something else similar to Artificing, only on fuckin' air, of all things. This time it absolutely glowed hard enough that even I could see it, and most of the class had their eyes shielded by this point. I'd kept pulling Mana from Mimic; faster than Saffron could use it, really, and it built up in me. My scars glowed, my hair floated in an unfelt breeze, single strands glowing off white as they crossed in front of my eyes.

"That's enough, love. The rest will just boost things."

"How much do you want to boost it?"

She laughed; the crystalline sound might have sounded brittle, maybe, but the fuzz in her voice kept it closer to sounding sharp enough to cut. "What you've gathered is enough."

I grinned her contagious good mood back at her. "Okay then. You need to be super precise about this?"

She grinned back. "If any of you still have your eyes open, shield them or suffer the consequences." Then she pressed her fingers into one portion of the Shape, turned back to me, and said, "give me everything you've got, love."

I laughed as I dumped Mana into her. It might have taken me a minute to stop pulling Mana from Mimic; she wanted to do this, it seemed. Saffron's head tipped back, an expression of pure ecstasy on her face. Her eyes rolled back, her mouth dropped open, and a long, drawn out breath escaped her as a torrent of Mana flowed through her into the Shape. About halfway through something in it snapped, not like something breaking, but like something had hit a point of no return. Like last time, a wave of Mana flowed out of the room in a circle, but instead of a maybe visible half meter-thick torus advancing with a crackling crunch, this was a three meter omnidirectional steamroller that crackled though the sky with the speed and power of a bolt of lightning.

Saffron's head lolled over to face me again. "Cadet Smith?"

It took Smith three tries to get noise to come out her mouth hole. "Yes, Archmage Aetos-Diaz?"

"Your questions will have to wait."

"May I know why?" I might have smacked her down, but I just felt too damn good.

Apparently Saffron did too. She just smiled and said, "Mana is the energy of life. Of living things. Undeath is a corruption of the Soul, one that warps a Soul from a structure which creates Mana into one that consumes it. Our Smite Spell, our Shape, grabs onto a Soul and... refines it. Repairs it, of course. Corrects and removes the corruption which makes a person Undead. Applied to a living, non-Undead Soul? It is... cleansing. Pleasant. Focusing."

"Would... would it harm someone? Heal them? Enhance them?"

Saffron shrugged. "That's more questions." She giggled. "But to clarify, it is refreshing, and might help correct secondary issues created by Mana Depletion or trying to gather or hold too much Mana. But mostly it is simply soothing. Pleasant. Not unlike holding reasonable amounts of Mana can be." She took a deep breath, giggled again. "I've just Shaped more Mana than anyone but High Priestess Diaz when she Cured New Amsterdam all at one go. I am, for the moment, until the feeling passes, at peace with myself and the world." Smith opened her mouth, but shut it with a snap when Saffron raised a single, stilling hand. "I choose to spend this time in worship. I will return when it passes."

"Meanwhile I've got stuff to do in Norfolk. I'm gonna get her home, she'll be back later. Okay, Karen?"

Doc Roberts took that moment to cut in. "I'm sure we've all plenty of observations to discuss until Archmage Aetos-Diaz returns. Go on."

With him waving us out of the room, I grabbed Saffron and the Marie with us, stepped back to our suite, and collapsed into myself. I wound up a little fuzzy, but before I could correct that, Saffron grabbed my hands. "Please. Goddess. Indulge me? Stay. As you are?"

Marie, who'd stepped behind Saffron with her hands wrapped around my Kitten from waist to armpits, making it look suspiciously like she might collapse if she didn't have Marie supporting her, simply said, "Stay."

So. I did.

We didn't go back to class after lunch. We didn't even really go to lunch. I'd sort of caught the edges of what she meant, about the whole cleansing feeling of working that much Mana into a world-spanning Smite Shape, but I didn't get it. Not the way Saffron did. Not until she showed me.

Oh, there was definitely more than a little 'worship' done through the day, but mostly? It was just the kind of touching you do with someone that makes you feel like everything is right with the world. That moment right after, when you're still soaring on a cloud of endorphins, before you can even wonder if the muscle twitches, the smell, the cooling sweat, or the need to piss will pull you out of it first. Only without any of those things happening. Not all morning, not all afternoon. By nightfall, if you told me I could step off the Academy roof and walk on air? I wouldn't have just believed it, I'd have thought someone a moron for thinking otherwise.

Menace rolled in right about then atop Marie's cart. She insta-fuzzed and started purring right along with the rest of us the moment she did, because I realized at that moment we had been for a while, and weren't about to stop any time soon. We curled up in a big fuzzy pile in the middle of a coding-Saffron free office, and at some point I wasn't fuzzy me in a pile, I was the center of the world, drowning in an avalanche of Saffron as Marie and Isnomi danced around my perimeter leaping and prancing, looking like Snoopy and Woodstock doing the dance of pure, unadulterated joy.

Some day maybe I'll be able to describe it properly. Maybe. To put that feeling of utter bliss into words so well that people feel it when I tell them. I'd like to be that kind of Goddess.

Even just once.