"...No, that's a perfectly fine ambition, and goodness knows I don't have a deathwish.  Though, uh, I don't really know if she's going to have any immortality on tap, in the very long term, so.  That's.  Something to consider eventually.  But you will have to interact with people other than her, in your present role."

"Given your current level of technology and the apparent level of hostile conflict in your culture, I expect to need unavailable maintenance before the end of master Deskyl's expected lifespan, ma'am." She's back to polite neutrality. "But I understand that I'll need to develop social skills suitable to your culture to serve her most effectively."

"...Firstly, I'm damn well going to figure out how to get you appropriate medical care if I have to invent another field of magical study to do it.  ...Probably should be able to do it with what I have on me, though; Void magic is good for 'I don't know how the hell it does it but I sure know what it does' sorts of conjuration, done properly, and - I know most of what I'd need to describe."

"Secondly: ...It's going to sound absurd, but - what you just said about understanding that you need to learn social skills appropriate to this culture, that throughline...it feels like it's missing the point.  What the point is, I am having the damnedest time putting into words, but - I did have one, with the original thought, and I think I must have missed on communicating it properly."

She thinks for a few seconds.

"Blasted..." Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra-isms... "...Well, I suppose that trying can't hurt even if I have even less idea if any of my follow-up ideas will work.

"It's.  The right action, done for the wrong reasons, is not usually fulfilling to human-typical minds.  And..."

"You have - if not a lineal descendant, then a very close cousin - to one of those, by all accounts."

"So do you get why I said adapting to your present situation would necessarily involve introspection?"

And she didn't even get to the idea she had had for trying to explain.  She's not sure why her brain does that.  ...Well, no, she has her suspicions - stupid 'brain works better when talking' things that she's very irked at it over.  But still.

"No, ma'am?"

...Okay.  She could admit that honestly she doesn't know why that was what she said either.  But.  It's a teaching moment.  Hopefully.  "And are you asking yourself why?  Are you considering whether the answers are sufficient, especially - when the galaxy has just been pulled out from under you?"

"I intend to talk to master Deskyl about it, ma'am?"

She nods, firmly.  "That's good.  ...I am - nominally in favor of peace and harmony in the galaxy, to be honest - if the metonymy makes sense - and I am inclined to recommend taking a few cues from Sith philosophy in this situation.  To say nothing of the benefits of talking things over with people you trust."

"Yes ma'am."

"...Frankly, I don't know if half the Jedi I've ever heard of knew half as much as they should have about what their own philosophy was, anyway," she mutters, mostly to herself.  "Don't get me started on the many and varied ways they've gone squirrely over the years.  To say nothing of any Force nonsense like apparently refusing to recognize droid sapience, though part of me keeps thinking that could be because nobody knows how to listen properly..."

"...Sorry, I don't really know why I said half of that.  Especially to you who has more right than most to tell me to sod off about the latter bits.  I guess it had just...built up."

"It's all right, ma'am." Fortunately, she does have programming for this type of social interaction.

"...But is it really."

"...Not that I'm doubting your word," she clarifies, "I'm doubting my ethics."

"...Anyway, was there anything in particular you were looking for, or are you just scanning Everything?"

"I'm researching what mundane technology you have here, ma'am. Or rather preparing to; I can read more quickly than most humans but not this quickly." She hasn't actually stopped scanning books at any point; she's a little more than halfway through her stack of them.

"Mm.  This isn't an engineering library, though there's going to be some information in the periphery of - oh, no, there's not really anything on enchanting in here either -

"But the thing is, that Villarosa's industry is its agriculture, where it's not our magic - and sometimes when it is - and that's all tied up in a big sociopolitical thing that is too complex to explain in this margin.  ...Not that I really know, anyway.  We don't have a lot of standardized artifice because that's what the dwarfholds do and they're better at it.  And then that's not even discussing the gnomes.  Gnomes are, culturally, the sort of people who you hand - a copy of the periodic table, information on the states of baryonic matter, and the words 'plasma-stabilized tri-ionic chromium-xenon substrate', to watch the explosions from a safe distance while they figure out how to use that to power a shrink ray."

"I didn't mean what you make, ma'am, I mean what master Deskyl and I can expect to encounter while we live here. Though I do expect that master Deskyl will want to know what the dwarves and gnomes are doing, too, eventually."

"Yeah.  And what I'm saying is that -

"The question of 'what will you encounter' could include a genuine gnomish shrink ray.  It probably won't.  But it could.  To say nothing of - that this planet isn't spacefaring is because nobody has managed to combine both capability and interest in sufficient quantities.  Not because it's beyond our capabilities."

"...And then there's a variety of industrial processes that are somewhat obsoleted by magic - you won't find mechanical looms so much as magically animate ones."

"I'll look into common magical alternatives to mundane technologies when I'm done with this, then, ma'am. Can you give me an idea of how often we should expect to encounter unusual technology, magical or otherwise?"

"...I'm not sure how to define 'unusual', here."

"But...Hmm.  'Things that are not things technology in your galaxy can do', I'd say...Not more than a 1% incidence, generously, around here.  Villarosa doesn't ban gnomish technology or anything stupid like that, but - people generally prefer reliable tools."

"...Though, security enchantments are probably a bit better at their jobs than mundane tech, generally."

1% of what? But it works out to 'fairly rare', anyway, it's fine. "Yes ma'am. Security enchantments?"

"Yeah.  Nothing is ever totally secure, but - in general, there's a lot less uncertainty about whodunit or where one's precious items went, should one be able to afford or erect that security in the first place - just from the nature of warding meaning that, in general, you have to cross the wardline somehow.  To say nothing of soulbound items or items with tracking tokens.  ...The former are more expensive."

"Master Deskyl will be interested in knowing about soulbound items, I think."

"...I can imagine.  ...Hell, if her kyber - or equivalent Force rock, I know there are various other sorts of things that function as 'saber crystals somehow but there's not many coming to mind - isn't halfway there already...  It's not a Villarosan specialty, but there are people who can do it."

"- I'm sorry, ma'am, I assumed you already knew; master Deskyl will kill anyone who tries to touch her lightsaber. She'll want to learn to do it herself if she wants it done."

"I didn't know, but I did suspect.  It's an esoteric bit of magic, is more why I said that she might need help with that. Relies on Death as its primary principle."

"Yes ma'am. What does soulbonding an object do?"