"It's directly for most searches. Might be worse for your virus scan."

"Oh of en for a direct search like that seems likely. -If we scan in a space-filling pattern so that nobody can walk between it but we're not scanning the whole area, that's a possible efficiency gain. Oh, do you have a concept of... Algorithm complexity? Some sorts are en-log-en, some are en-squared..."

"It's fairly advanced but yes, I have the concept. I agree, oh of en is most likely."

"If we did it top-down I think it could be oh of en log n, or something like that, worst case. Bottom up is much better, it'd just be oh of en... Huh. I haven't actually looked at the rel'he'ar yet, how do you do that?"

"Just sing kaldea-anske rel'he'ar. That'll give you the top level board and navigation from there via a touch interface."

"Kaldea-anske rel'he'ar."

A flat panel appears with a message board displayed. All the text is in Hymnos; this seems to be a welcome board with a tutorial on how to navigate the rest of the rel'he'ar stickied, along with a listing of boards. The listed boards include: Casual Lounge, Hymnos Practice, Travel Lounge, Muse Connections, Code Help & Review...

"Huh. You don't mind if I explore this a while, do you?"

Poke, travel lounge.

"I don't mind."

The travel lounge has a bunch of threads about potential journeys to be made, meetups being planned, and stickied threads about known navigational hazards. Apparently there are monsters in some places in this world.  

Huh. What are some interesting travel locations?

"Yeah, I'm just... Still feeling lost, like I should be doing something. I'd be in school by now, normally."

There is a ring of mountains around the site of the Key, and it's traditional for rel'he to pilgrimage there. (Stickied thread.) There are a few larger cities which might be able to provide more resources for his research. There's a particularly monsterhaunted stretch of woodlands that he might want to steer well clear from. The oceans have no monsters but are treacherous enough to be well-respected. Land travel is generally safer.

"There's nothing you need to do this instant. Relax a bit, if you can. Try to settle in. We're working on getting you your own room."

"I guess... I don't really want to ask for an allowance, but uh, I do need clothes. The Key sounds like a major target for Corruptors... I might want to move to a big city once I know what the hell's going on. More people and stuff to invent with. What's the story with all the monsters?"

"Descendants of people with twisted Heartsongs from the first few times this happened, living in wild places and preying on foot traffic. They are... not good people."

"Shit. Not just - beasts, or rogue machines or something?"

"Those too, but most often in the hands of people."

"Maybe there are some inventions I shouldn't invent."

He looks through the message boards a while longer.

"...Do you guys have, like, board games?"

"Yeah, we do, check in the chat lounge."

He checks the chat lounge.

There's a hidden-information game with role cards, something vaguely chesslike, a game that involves linking together similar-sounding Hymnos words, "count to 100 before a shaldea comes"...

He snerks at the last one and is sorely tempted to post 'hi', but that would be a terrible idea. Actually, he shouldn't post anything at all here, if it'd break the news about him.

"Any, like, private-to-this-user-collective boards?"

"Yeah, the 'local instance' link ought to be in the top right."

Local instance it is.

"The rel'he'ar is actually really familiar and - nostalgic? I'm glad. But anything I post is going to be marked remote admin, you see. I take it there's not really a way to make a fake account or anything?"

The local instance thread listing is as so:

* Rosalie's Art Commission Thread

* Collective Events Calendar

* Maintenance Check List

* Current House Staff

Job Leads

Code Review

Sledge Project

Festival Lightshow Signups

Ateki Club

Hymnos help please? 

Muse Matching

Open House?

... (52 more threads)

"No," says Hannah. "There isn't really. But I'm glad you have something familiar here."

"Sledge project could use a different name, in my opinion. It could also use wheels, you can still build brakes into them and it'd be a lot quieter unless you're just going to hover the thing constantly, in which case they'd be a lot more force-efficient. They're called trains, trams, or cars. Trams are closest to what you're doing."

He looks at 'hymnos help please' and the events calendar.

"I'll keep that in mind."

"Hymnos help please" is a request for tutoring from an apprentice rel'he like him. It's in broken Hymnos; clearly he doesn't have much knowledge. 

The events calendar has a festival marked in three weeks. In four days there's "Hannah Evening - Group Recharge", and in a week there's an exhibition of Rosalie's paintings out on the town. In ten days there's physical Ateki being played. In twelve days there's a class on rope and its uses. Code tutoring on fridays.