"Apparently not just ambient, then," says Martin.

Itaruko looks slightly confused and tilts his head, keeping the globe up.

"It might be a species feature," Fenris ponders.

"Still looks fairly magical to me."

He frowns, snuffs the illusion, and walks back in. "Huh?"

"Might be a species thing, not a world thing, looks magical," says Martin.

"I mean, I continue to be pretty sure it's not magical, and if you guys don't have it that would suggest a species thing, yeah?"

"Likely, but it could be something else, maybe it works because you are exposed to something in your world since birth. Did your species' ancestors have it as well?"

"As in, evolutionary ancestors? I… think so? There was some sort of study that looked at that sort of thing, I think. It doesn't leave traces, though – once you snuff it, it's gone, so we don't exactly have it in the fossil record?"

"And nothing similar on other animals? Like the ability to generate heat or something?"

"Lumen doesn't do heat anyway, not much unless you poke at it a lot, and even then it's hardly got any range, but no, not that I know of."

"Anyway, what else can you say about your world?"

"I'm not really sure what to compare it to!" he says. "It has cities, we have the three species, we have lumen which is apparently a thing you don't have… You still have, uh, sense of smell and taste and stuff, right, we're not just missing something else relatively fundamental?"

Martin comes in from the door and nods. "Eyesight and hearing, too, presumably? You have proprioception and pain and, I dunno, emotions, consciousness, psychology, biology, science in general, medicine?"

"Yeah. But lumen is more a skill or ability, not a field of study, so I wouldn't expect those to necessarily be different?"

"Still, how about other things? Animals like bears? Lions? Tigers? Fish?"

"Or food, like ice cream or chocolate?"

"No to the bears, lions and tigers, yes to the fish, ice cream and chocolate."

"Weird that you have a specific plant species like cocoa trees. Are you a mammal? You look like one."

"Yeees? Probably. I mean, I'm not sure we have the same classifications as you do on that sort of stuff. Do you have vanilla? Strawberries? And, uh– animals, do you have, uh, kutsiar? Namanth?"

"Yes to the plants. No to the animals. Mammals are warm-blooded animals most notable for having hair and glands that produce milk, most gestate their young inside, but some lay eggs. There are other differences, but those are the most likely to stand out for the layman."

"That would make me a mammal, yeah, because– wait, do you have females?"

"Yep. At least, females exist in my species, and I'm assuming they do in theirs too."

"We do have females, and just to be sure, you require both the male and female sexes to produce babies, after about nine months of gestation inside the female."

"… How long are your months? It's like six months for us, but I think Thamari take a bit longer – not by much?"