From Olath's diary

That is no place for a weak city. The humans
in one another's arms , the elves, like bird in the trees,
-those doggoned generations- keep breeding
all summer long.

Whatever is begotten born and dies, that is true.
One wins through skills, not through sheer numbers, that is also true, BUT ...

Let's face reality, we've been chased from city to city, these blasted surfacers have been too much for our rotten teeth. For my own rotten teeth.

I look in the mirror , no lines, of course, no wrinkles, but all the same i stay an aged drow.
My old body is no more
than a dusty, tattered coat,
crumbling away, second after second.
I can feel it fall, hour after hour.

The spring of my own life besieged.

It's time to act. It's time to stake everything on a single card.

For every tatter in my mortal dress, a spell.
Into the artefice of eternity, i must rest.

Once out of nature i shall never take my bodily form from any natural thing.
I won't be above, no, but by the side , by the side of this female mage,
too clever to be a mere puppet. Too clever to kill me now, while i'm still trapped in this decaying cage of meat and bones.

Enough of this , the most secret chest is my own mind, i believe Alev's spiders to be spying me, reporting everything to Omulu.
So be it, as long as she doesn't know i know, i still have an advantage.

About more practical matters:

I have been trying to hire some spy, and in the process, i let the surfacers believe i have more , customers, shall i say? than i actually have.
Mining their moral is the most reliable tactic i can think of.
As long as we are so weak and so proud, we need to act with unsurpassed skills.

I am too old to believe it's another test of LLoth , it's a mere wheel, which shall keep turning
and turning...
...and turning...

Untill you break it and make yourself free