The others returned the bow while Ferrudion observed the other man a bit more closely. After all, he had decided earlier to spend more time looking at mortals.

This man's hair was as white as Kalou Saha's and his eyes were as light as Ferrudion's. Unlike Ferrudion's golden eyes, however, this man's eyes were a very light blue.

‘I should investigate mortal eye colors as well,’ Ferrudion mused.

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Sir Ksanten. Our guide, Miss Karla Sapuk here, highly recommended your Luminous Moon,” Lemme om Apox explained in Pakpak.

Kalou Saha wondered not for the first time how a pahipiti had learned such good manners.

“I am grateful for the privilege to welcome you here at our humble establishment,” Sir Ksanten replied with a polite smile.

All the while, Ferrudion continued his observations. Sir Ksanten and the other unnamed mortals in this room were all as pale as Karla Sapuk. And most of them, Sir Ksanten included, had angular faces with little to no facial hair.

Sir Ksanten and Lemme om Apox had continued their exchange of nineties, but it had now reached a point where it required his input.

“Pelou Dean-agam, we can either stay in separate rooms for two gold per room per night or in a suite with three bedrooms for ten gold per night,” Lemme om Apox asked Ferrudion in I!onian.

Frankly, the prices were outrageous, but Lemme om Apox knew that he could create gold from seemingly nothing.

To Ferrudion, gold was indeed nothing but a material metal that could be made with a simple magic.

‘Separate rooms, huh? I cannot leave these mortals alone, duh. They are so weak.’

Besides, he wanted them nearby so that they could translate and answer his questions.

“The suite.”

Lemme om Apox shook her fist twice in acknowledgement and turned back to Sir Ksanten, but he smiled and said in I!onian, “The suite it shall be, Pelou Dean-agam,” revealing that he not only understood but spoke the language.

“How many languages do you speak?” Ferrudion asked the mortal with interest.

The man's soul was too weak for him to become a proper translator like Lemme on Apox, but Ferrudion wanted to know how many languages a mortal could learn.

Switching back to Pakpak, the mortal answered,

“I grew up speaking Bokka and Eastern Silusian, Buka Silusian to be precise, and learned Pakpak at school. These three languages are the only ones I am truly proficient in.

“Later, I picked up a few other languages like I!onian, but while I can converse in them, my command of those languages is superficial.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

“If you count all languages that I could greet guests in, that would be thirty-five languages in total.”

Ferrudion blinked a few times while he processed the information.

‘How many mortal languages are there? Why do they need so many languages?!’

Gods rarely used these tongues, opting to rely on different methods of spiritual communication instead.

The kind of soul link Ferrudion was using was usually reserved for trusted friends and family members; for, it was possible to use such links to harm another's soul.

Naturally, Ferrudion had little to fear from these mortals, but he would hesitate to establish such a connection with another greater god.

Usually, greater gods relied on managy to transmit concepts without establishing a direct soup link. But even that could be used to harm another's soul.

Of course, unlike a soul link, harming someone's soul with a managy construct was anything but trivial. Since the other god had to allow the managy entry, an attacker would need to hide their intent.

Making an offensive managy construct look like communication magic was difficult. However, it was very possible. In fact, it had been done many times.

All things considered, greater gods would rather use less direct communication methods when conversing with enemies, strangers, or particularly dangerous individuals.

One such individual was Ferrudion's mother. Her son's aside, she never used anything other than her alliances chosen tongue.

How did these god-made tongues work? They assigned standardized concepts to set words and phrases, structured the intent as grammar, and then propagated those lists through chains of trust.

His mother had taught Ferrudion the language through soul link. Thus, he could likewise propagate it to his future subordinates, children, spouses, and whomever else he trusted enough to use spiritual communication methods with, thereby introducing them to the alliance.

Such languages usually had a very large inventory and were very rigid. It was difficult to introduce new words as it required propagating them to all the parties involved.

It was not uncommon for a conversation to start by one conversation partner, usually the one who considered their knowledge the most outdated, listing of all the words, phrases, and grammar they knew. The other conversation partners would then acknowledge that they knew the corresponding concept or intention; and should something come up that not everyone was familiar with, it would be excluded from the language for the duration of that conversation.

Another thing of note would be that not all such languages were sound based. Different alliances had different preferences.

Lastly, it would be important to note that there were also some other situations that might preclude the usage of a spiritual language:

Soul ailments could destabilize a greater gods soul too much for them to handle the processing of new concepts safely.

A greater god restructuring their soul could not allow outside concepts to disturb the process.

The power difference could be too great to allow for a risk free spiritual exchange, as was the case with Ferrudion and most mortals.

Still, Ferrudion had not thought it possible for so many different mortal tongues to exist.

‘Are they really all different?’

He remained doubtful.

While he and Sir Ksanten had conversed, a new group of mortals had joined them. They had descended the stairs to his left while chatting in some unknown language. When the man in the lead caught sight of Ferrudion, however, he briskly strode up to them.

Sir Ksanten turned to greet the man, but the man spoke first,

“I hopp zad will nod be z-daying here.”

The man's Pakpak had a strange accent, different from the softness that Kalou Saha and Kalou Dan had when speaking the language.

Ferrudion looked around for the object in question while the rest of his mortals frowned.

“Viscount Daz, may I introduce Lord Dean Pelou, the youngest son of,” Sir Ksanten tried to introduce them, but he was cut off by the rude mortal.

“I will nod be acquainded wiz zuch an unlucky creazure.”

‘Did that mortal just call me an unlucky creature?’ Ferrudion wondered.

image [https://fiction.piwigo.com/_datas/v/2/b/v2busyygfu/i/uploads/v/2/b/v2busyygfu//2024/05/18/20240518185557-af88d44a-xl.png]