Even with the fear, even with that deeply rooted fear of the thing inside of him waiting to tear him apart, he's going to be one of those assholes who thinks his faith sustains him. And stubborn determination. He sighs, a deep and vaguely annoyed sound, shaking his head.

"How many Templars, active ones, who still take the damn stuff do you think are in Riftwatch right now? And how often do we go up against mages? The Venatori are pretty much all mages, and we can't rely on the Divine's help since she called all the faithful of the Order back to her new Exalted March, which is going just swimmingly." Oh yeah, and this Divine also isn't the friendliest to a lot of their people. "We need to be able to shut that shit down at the source." The long and the short of it, as far as he's concerned. If they can't disconnect mages from their powers out in the field, then they can't win. Maybe that's closed-minded of him, but in a numbers game? Riftwatch is vastly outnumbered.

"I'm here to make a difference. This is how I make a difference! If all you needed was a guy to swing a sword, lots of people can swing a sword. If all you needed was a librarian or another guy who likes to read a little too much when not swinging a sword, you can find that, too. This is what I do. Let me do this."