In Futility of Defense, Bryan Cole’s second installment in an epic fantasy series, A Paladin’s Journey, Krell is called by his patron god, ReckNor, to the coastal town of Waterford to help its people fight back against a peculiar threat:

Properly called the sahuagin, the shark-like sea devils lived under the waves. They were predators, and while they started small and bestial, they grew larger as they aged. More than that, they also gained intelligence. When one grew large enough, it attracted a school of them, bound to its will. Such groups swarmed in search of food, and instead of feeding on one another as they usually would, they worked together to hunt larger prey.

Every so often, they came ashore to hunt people.

Even on land, the sea devils were faster than a swift runner, and were exceptional climbers. Their talons and huge, teeth-filled maws made them deadly combatants in a fair fight. They often attacked in darkness and rain, seizing every advantage they could find for themselves.

Krell wasn’t completely certain, but he believed he’d been called to stand against the sea devils. He wished ReckNor would just explain why he had called him.

YOU MUST FIRST SURVIVE THE BATTLE TONIGHT.

ReckNor’s voice crashed like a tsunami into Krell’s thoughts. He had a lot of practice listening to that voice and controlled his reactions. Instead of flinching, he just shuddered slightly.

Are you ever going to explain to me what else I’m supposed to do?

IN TIME, PERHAPS.

Krell sighed. It was never easy being a paladin.

To defeat these amphibious demons and fulfill ReckNor’s orders, Krell bands together with a team of allies big enough to fill the pages of this epic fantasy. Kirkus Reviews notes that “a dazzling cast brightens this tale of clashing swords and spellcasting,” and “Krell makes an admirable hero who enjoys rescuing others.”

But “rescuing others” isn’t necessarily what being a paladin is all about. Cole, who works in enterprise software and makes his home in Toronto with his wife, daughter, and a beloved cat, is a devoted fan of the paladin trope. He cites fantasy stories like Elizabeth Moon’s The Deed of Paksenarrion and Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman’s Dragonlance Chronicles for sparking his imagination about how to use paladins in interesting ways.

“Most fantasy settings will usually have a concept of multiple gods,” he says. “Each of those gods is a tangible, obviously real force. There are gods of good, who are noble and just, who call a holy warrior to defend the faithful, and therefore that warrior, the paladin, is also noble and just and truthful. But when you look at any religion, there are people who do both good and bad things in the name of the same god. So the idea of a god being purely ‘good’ doesn’t interest me.”

What does interest Cole is a fantasy world of diverse gods with different kinds of interests, who would naturally call different types of people with varying motivations to serve as their paladins. Some paladins serving the more traditional, upright gods struggle to follow a litany of strict rules of honor. Others have different ideas about what it means to follow their patron god and therefore fight with their fellow paladins over who is right.

Krell, Cole’s protagonist in Futility of Defense, serves ReckNor, who doesn’t have any system of behavioral rules for his paladins to obey. God of the seas and skies, he holds freedom above all. “And while you’re free to choose, the consequences of your actions are yours, and you have to own them,” says Cole. “I really wanted to read the kind of story where a paladin is called by a more erratic god. It gives you a very different take on what a paladin can be.”

Cole’s technology career helps him a lot in his writing career, as he uses software to organize his worldbuilding. “Really what that does is ensure consistency,” he says. “It takes people out of the reading experience when things suddenly change, or when characters develop a power that they don’t have to struggle to learn. In a book, you want that process of characters putting in the work for something that pays off in the future.”

Cole’s books also consider that concept of consistency—of setting something up that will have continued consequences down the line—in Krell’s allegiance to ReckNor. The god speaks directly to Krell in his mind, giving him orders without fully explaining them. Krell tries to obey ReckNor to the best of his abilities, trusting that eventually things will make sense. But at the same time, ReckNor’s personality and focus on freedom of choice allows Krell a lot of space to make his own decisions and grapple with the outcomes.

“I feel like I’ve been telling stories like this for a long time,” says Cole. “Whether I’m engaged in tabletop role-playing games or telling stories to my daughter, I think there should be a lot of realism, even in a fantasy story.” Cole says that much of the feedback he gets on his A Paladin’sJourney series comes down to his attention to realistic detail. “In real life, you interact with at least five people a day, even briefly. Those people will have their own names and backgrounds.” Cole wants his stories to feel like real places where real people live among magic and tempestuous gods, believing that if the author doesn’t do their due diligence to get all those details right, then the story fails to be immersive.

Kirkus praises Futility of Defense for the “chiseled prose [that] keeps the narrative humming, even though combat scenes occur infrequently. The final act, however, amps up the action when Krell’s war against the sea devils explodes. In between the violence, Cole squeezes in some much-welcome humor. Krell’s conversations with ReckNor, for example, often lead to amusing exchanges.”

To get all that organization, detail, and story written down while also leading the typically busy life of a professional and parent, Cole tries to do what he can, when he can. Sometimes that means finally getting a few hours to himself, not feeling up to getting words on the page, and doing research instead. That way, when he does feel more in the mood to write, he can devote his full attention to the page and finish several chapters in one sitting without having to pause to look something up or study something.

This system of working has gotten Cole through the first book in the series, Beginning of Arrogance, as well as Futility of Defense, and he says he has plans for five more books. But he does acknowledge the possibility of more if his ideas start stretching out. “I have a solid idea of where I want each book to begin and end,” he says. “If that journey in between gets sufficiently big and I can’t see a way to cut anything, we might end up with more.”

Even if he does have to expand past his seven-book plan, Cole is committed to fleshing out all the details of everything that matters and makes his stories feel real, while also omitting anything that doesn’t serve that purpose. “If I put something in a book, even it doesn’t immediately make sense in the moment, you know that eventually it’s going to come back around and pay off.”

Chelsea Ennen is a writer living in Brooklyn.