The human-orc-half-orc waves his hand in the air, clutching a small marble between his fingers. Using his other hand, he holds onto the shoulder of one of the tritons.

That triton holds hands with the next triton-

-who holds hands with the next, and then Areus-

-while another takes his other hand-

-and so on, until the last triton wraps an arm around the waist of the triton holding onto the seaweed.

Okay, he can hold hands. The relatively tiny hands, which he is careful not to hurt.

After a few more seconds of marble-clutching, the colors all around them swirl and Areus becomes disoriented as he suddenly falls, no longer holding onto anyone.

He can, now, see the hustle and bustle of a city in motion all around him, and several tritons floating around him as they regain their wits as well.

He keeps his eyes watchful while the Tritons and the human-orc-half-orc recover. This is much bigger than any underwater settlements he ever visited. The various aquatic people just don't cluster this much. What kind of place did they land on?

There are all different kinds of people here, doing all kinds of things that don't make much sense. There are objects floating above the people near them, which would be perfectly sensible if suspended in water- but this dome seems to be full of air. There are many species here Areus has never encountered, most of which are bipedal; an individual of one such unfamiliar species is running towards them clumsily.

The human-orc-half-orc steps forward to greet the newest arrival.

They talk, and the newcomer waves his staff and says something that Areus cannot understand, and then-

"...sentence in your language. This is a sentence-"

"That was a sentence in my language!" Areus says brightly. "Hello, there."

"Oh! Hello. Yes, this will last one minute. One hour, one day, breathe, eat, food, yes, no, uh, oh dear...say words while I can understand your speech, please. Thank you!"

Several of the tritons are paying rapt attention.

He repeats the words the fish-person just said and adds. "Giant. Left. Right. Down. Up. Stay. Move. Food. Bathroom. Work. Danger. Safe. Friend. Enemy. Sleep. Wake up. Point. Object. Person. One. Two. Three. Add. Subtract. Divide. Multiply. Equal. Different. Person. Animal. Name. My. Yours. Theirs. I. You. They. We. He. She. Sorry. Understand. Repeat." He can go on...

"...no," they interject when he gets to 'sorry'.

"No...three? No three words sorry."

They turn to the tritons and proceed to repeat some of the words they exchanged with Areus. There seems to be some confusion and argument about the last words he said: the pronouns, 'sorry', 'understand', and 'repeat'.

One of the tritons does turn to Areus.

"I you one day he repeat you speech. One day, repeat, add words. Two day, repeat, add words... three day..."

Huh. If he is reading the situation correctly, this isn't a full on translation power, just something that last for a short while? Okay. Foreign magic. Shouldn't be surprising. They didn't get the pronouns and those three words. Which, is unfortunate, because what the trition just said could be easily replied with "I understand".

"Yes." Areus replies. "One day, repeat, add words. Two plus two day, repeat, add words?"

"Two 'plus' two...equal..."

He pauses.

"Two plus two equal four. You 'understand' four? I...understand...giant, day, left, down, right, up...sleep, wake up, one, two, three?"

"Four." He completes, and after a moment adds. "Giant sleep. Person sleep," he points at the staff-wielding fish-person, "Giant wake up. Person wake up. Add Words."

-nod.

"Giant eat? One eat? Two eat? Three? Four? Day six hours sleep."

"Giant eat, three eat. Sleep six hours. Giant work?"

"One day giant work, one day giant eat. Yes?"

"Yes." That's usually how it works when you don't do subsistence farming or foraging. "Giant stay? Giant work, eat, sleep?"