They point towards the denser part of the city and give confusing directions relative to their cousin Ihrad's place and the tall tower that's got a slide and the place with the chickens.

Well, fortunately he can get further directions from the shuttle hovering invisibly over the city, in position to try to spot things like the tall tower with a slide (why a slide? Eltran is so curious!) 

The slide seems to be just so kids can slide down it, which they are doing by the dozens. The trolley seems to be a very early steam-powered rail trolley system, not very reliable and demanding lots of coal.

It's nonetheless pretty impressive, compared to the visible tech level in the other ('Elf'?) cities. Eltran wanders around and looks at architecture and mostly tries not to draw too much attention to himself, an obvious interloper, but if any of the locals approach he'll ask them more questions about their lives in the city. 

He intermittently checks in with the shuttle about how much Tongues time he has left, and when he's down to fifteen minutes starts heading for the outskirts of the city, while the shuttle crew look for an isolated or hidden area where they can land. 

People are very startled to see him but mostly not rude. The average age looks to be early adolescence; almost everyone has some young children with them. The steam powered trolley is the only example of such technology in the city; it otherwise looks preindustrial. There's a lot of construction.

He gets a look at as many city features as he can, tries to ask people he sees about the invention of the trolley system, and then escapes before he loses the ability to talk to them. 

They mostly don't know much about it except, yes, it's based on mining technology, and it runs on coal, and no other cities have it so it's a tourist attraction.

It's all very interesting, and then Eltran takes the shuttle directions to head out and be collected. 

...

Meanwhile, another few of Mhalir's staff (both selected because of their long hair, now properly tied back with ribbons) have been poking around the edges of Lothlan and Brithombar. 

Mhalir has been paying somewhat more attention to Eltran's microphone transmissions; he has one of the ship's crew assignment to monitor each, of course, in case of any problems. 

<What do you think?> he asks Carissa. 

Lothlan and Brithombar are beautiful cities, shockingly prosperous for how they evidently haven't invented industry, both of them built around their ports. Everyone is richly dressed; most of them wear jewelry; they sing, sometimes a whole block of them the same song, presumably telepathically coordinated. There are a few children, but few even for a human city, not just in comparison to the orcs. Many of the houses have stained-glass windows and all of them have exquisite wooden porches, where their residents stand around singing to each other. 

Everyone is very concerned about the malfunctioning soul, and of the opinion that the victims should get that looked at.

:The orcs seem more like people: she says immediately. :I guess if the gods made the others like that that might explain it....

...maybe they don't have free will.:

<....Huh. Can you - unpack that more? They seem odd to me but not nearly that odd.> 

:Outsiders in Golarion don't have free will and they can still carry on a conversation fine. They're just missing - discontent, contradictory goals, the impulse to disobedience.... it'd be a god of art or something, who just wanted friendly trusting people who make art all the time...:

<Hmm. How do you know that Ousiders lack free will, for this definition of it? ...I think that on Earth there are some humans who are low on discontent and contradictory goals and the urge to disobedience, and this is just what one ought expect given various traits on a bell-curve distribution, and chance, and the population size on Earth, but - you seem to think of it as something more fundamental than that...?>

:...yes. It' s not just an Asmodean thing, though I guess I don't know how Aroden would describe it. Originally people didn't have free will, and outsiders don't, and someone gave it to mortals but it was stupid of them. I think it's more of a difference than just 'people vary in how compliant they are', like, I score very well for that but I'd still need a lot of correction if you didn't like me thinking things you disagree with. Someone without free will isn't just good at being cooperative they don't have any desires that are in conflict with it.:

<....That seems - kind of horrifying to me? An agent that - doesn't question the orders given to it...?>

:The ship doesn't question the orders the pilot gives it.:

<...You mean the ship computer? But - that has far less intelligence than a human mind...at least, if we consider intelligence pointed in the direction of - agency, of interpreting ambiguous instructions and comprehending complex realities and...making sane choices based on those.... This ship would jump us into a black hole, if that were in the instructions the pilot gave it, and think nothing of this even if it knew the inevitable results....>

:I think not having free will still permits, uh, noticing that you probably don't want to jump into a black hole. I don't know. I haven't thought about - theology - much recently -

- and maybe something different is wrong with the locals but I can't think what. And the orcs said that the gods were angry about how they were made, which fits.:

<I am not sure what to think of that. I think - well, no offence, but if I had taken everything you said and believed about Asmodeus seriously, I would have ended up believing something very wrong according to what I actually care about...>

A mental shrug. <I agree that something here feels off. I think we need more information on the Elves side of the story, regarding theology, but...well, we already have significant evidence that the Elves are...non-agentic and nonviolent. This is not the lowest-risk plan for us, but - I would propose we hide ourselves within Detect Thoughts range while one of my staff asks an Elf difficult questions about religion. What do you think?>?

:Sure.:

<All right. We can of course take all the reasonable precautions, but - I think we need this information...> 

And they can sit down and take the full debriefs from everyone sent down to talk to the locals.

Mhalir, to be honest, shares Carissa's impression that the orcs seem...more like people? More like his people? He's not quite sure what the concept is, here, but there's something. 

They think and plan and discuss, and then sleep, and then Carissa can prepare her spells - Tongues to cast on Mhalir's staff, and Detect Thoughts a few times, and Mhalir suggests Teleport just in case they need to bug out to the shuttle, which can make sure to stay in range...

And elsewhere:

"Show me the coordinates again - here...?" 

"Yes, here." 

Ma'ar just nods.