Keeper Vairia's lecture on the Sneak Thief lasted for three weeks, with each class delving further and further into the history of the Sneak Thief and his deeds.
During the second week, Keeper Vairia spoke of what was known as the 'Metal Age' when the Mechanist faction began to rise to power within the Eternal City, waging war with both the Hammerites and Pagans in their efforts to seize control.
"Karras, or Father Karras as he was called once he solidified his position of power, broke away from the Hammerite Order shortly after the Dark Project failed." Keeper Vairia explained.
"The Mechanist order which he founded, held similar beliefs to the Hammerite Order they stemmed from, with some key differences however, namely, Karras' extreme tendencies and views.
Where the Hammerites sought progress through conservation, the Mechanists were far more aggressive with their methods, Karras himself believing that nature was… Well, naturally inferior, imperfect, a direct defilement of the Master Builders plan."
Keeper Vairia had gone over the ancient religions of the city some months back, detailing their belief structures, Garrett never understood any of them, not that he quite understood the Keepers either, but at least the Keepers didn't need to worship anything.
"Father Karras' idea of an ideal world was a world built from the ground up by men, no natural life, no plants or animals, simply man and machine."
Garrett nearly snorted at that from his seat, silently of course, but Keeper Vairia was an attentive teacher.
"Sounds ridiculous, doesn't it?" Keeper Vairia asked his class, he received many blank stares, but the few attentive students he cherished all nodded.
"But, that was his image of an ideal world, and thus, that was his master plan. To devise a way to render the city, maybe even all of Morley should he have succeeded, barren of earthly bounties, and his plan was quite ingenious too.
Despite being certifiably mad, Father Karras was, for all his faults, brilliant, brilliant enough to forge a compound capable of turning organic material into alloys."
Keeper Vairia paused to write 'Rust Gas' on the board.
"His plan was also frankly quite brilliant. See, Father Karras despite his radical line of thinking, was a very charismatic character, able to sway his Hammerite brothers and sisters to leave their order and follow him.
Karras was also very influential when it came to persuading people outside of his order. The old nobility of the city were very charmed by Father Karras' inventions and some of his ideologies, enough so that many were willing to invest in Karras' ingenuity, which was a massive part of Karras' plan."
Keeper Vairia offered his more attentive students a smile.
"The city has changed much over the past centuries, but at a time, the city was once a thriving metropolis. There was still a massive disparity between the wealthy and poor, but not nearly as it is today, there was also a stable middle merchant class and most importantly, gardens."
From all the years Garrett had spent on the streets, the most plant life he had ever seen within the walls of the city were the twisted, gnarled weeds that somehow managed to find their way through the cobblestone streets, dry, dead grass, grey with ash and twisted…
Garrett could hardly imagine what the city would look like with gardens, sprawling green expanses…
"Of course, the only people who could afford, let alone maintain gardens were the nobility and upper middle class." Keeper Vairia continued;
"But, those were the people Father Karras was most interested in. see, in order for the Rust Gas to function as intended, it required a vicious cycle of consumption, when Rust Gas interacted with plant life or other forms of biological material, the byproduct of the transmutation was more Rust Gas.
Father Karras intended to use the gardens of the city as the launching point of his plan, the gardens were large enough to create a surplus of Rust Gas which would spread out across the city, destroying any plant life not caught in the initially infected areas."
Keeper Vairia returned to the board to attempt to draw a loose diagram of the winding city streets far above them, speaking all the while as he worked.
"However, as many of you should know, as they are today, the noble class of the time were just as selective when it came to who they associated with, if not more so. And religion wasn't exactly seen as charming to the nobility, too many rules that impeded their worldly desires, too many expectations of charity and abstinence…
And so to gain favor with the nobility, Father Karras re-flavored the Hammerite scriptures he favored to better serve his cause. Where the Hammerites discouraged overindulgence, unrestrained desires and sins like greed and pride, things that the noble class practically lived and breathed at the time;
Father Karras made arguments in support of them. If you work hard, you should be allowed to indulge yourself. So long as desires are beneficial and consensual, there should be no reason to withhold them so rigidly. Pride should be taken in one's achievements, greed should be used to further oneself, so on and so forth."
Keeper Vairia turned back to the class with a strange outline of the city behind him. It wasn't a bad sketch, but it was certainly different, very, very different from the diagrams in other classes Garrett had seen.
The streets looked far wider in the diagram Keeper Vairia had done, but strangely, the widened streets did nothing to diminish the density of the homes…
"But gaining the nobility's favor was only the first step in Father Karras' plan. He could have himself invited over to as many lavish parties as he wanted, but that wouldn't allow him to set his plan in motion.
Now, beforehand, I called Father Karras a genius, and I will stand by that statement for as long as I live. However… Karras' ambition led him to very dark paths, fueled him to create strange and cruel inventions, People made into metal abominations, that had no pulse or mind but still moved and obeyed.
These were Karras' greatest inventions, the Masked Servants he called them, designed to serve and little else… These inventions were the key to the success of his plot, each servant was created holding a small vessel containing compressed Rust Gas.
Father Karras intended to sell these servants to the nobility and utilize them to sterilize the city of organic life."
Keeper Vairia sighed as he returned to his desk, taking his seat quietly before he began speaking again.
"It does not bode well to think what would have happened had Karras' plan come to fruition… Irrevocable changes, complete and total ecological destruction… And once again, it is only due to the Sneak Thief that you, I and most likely, the City, maybe all of the Isles stand today."