She comes back with much the same as last time. A little less mushroom, a little more meat.

This food is going to get very unappealing with much more repetition. Leareth eats it dutifully. 

:What were you planning to do today?: he asks Lucy. :Is there anything where I could help without using magic: 

"I was going to talk to my scientists at the University." 

Collaboration with compatibly-minded fellows. Those who pursue knowledge. A center of learning. (The art of breaking the Great Chain.)

Aaaaaaaaah it is very ambiguous whether that's an invitation to accompany her or not. Leareth hates ambiguity. 

He grits his teeth. :May I come with you: A hesitation. :...I would prefer not to be here alone all day when I do not know anyone else: 

"Sure! Do you want to try to learn the language. Your telepathy seems to be serving you well but I don't think it will let you read." 

The wry acknowledgment of the ephemeral nature of realtime communication.

It's a concrete goal that seems robustly useful in a variety of circumstances and also unlikely to destroy anything if he's wrong about the nature of reality. :Yes. I would like that: 

"Great. If I write down our alphabet now, do you think you could benefit from studying it on the way over?"

Pleasure at having identified an achievable goal. The process of breaking a goal down into manageable steps. 

:Maybe? Depends on the method of transit and how distracting it is: 

"I was thinking we would walk." 

Bipedal locomotion [the mechanics thereof].

:Walking is fine. I am not sure I will manage much useful studying on the way, but I can try: Leareth still tends to be very distracted and on-edge when walking through public spaces, especially unfamiliar ones, and he expects this to apply even more to places where he might randomly be assaulted and stabbed or pushed into a cursed well by cultists of an evil god or something. 

She writes down the English alphabet, hands him the sheet, and leads him out into the streets. 

Leareth is, indeed, immediately distracted by stretching his senses, magical and otherwise, to their full extent, trying to orient to what's happening around him. He sticks very close to Lucy. 

There is a lot of magic. Most of it is less than Lucy or the Bazaar or the well, but there's at least a little of it almost everywhere. 

The crowd isn't quite as bad around her as it is otherwise. People mostly recognize her and get out of her way. 

Mage-sight would be a lot more informative if he recognized any of the magic. Leareth tries to file away as many details as possible for future consideration. 

Eventually he shields his Othersenses a bit more, so he can sense the presence minds and magic but not too much detail. Having all the information makes him feel safer in a way but it's also overwhelming and giving him a headache. He's grateful that at least being next to Lucy means no one physically colliding with him. 

He does manage a few glances at his alphabet-reference paper. It's a good distraction. 

They reach the University. Lucy leads him across campus and towards a laboratory. 

"Hello the house!" she calls as she pushes the door open. 

"Hello, sister." 

She bounces over and hugs him. 

"--This is Leareth, can you teach him English?" she asks him brightly. 

He turns to Leareth and raises an eyebrow. 

Aaaaaaaaaah a person he doesn't know. 

Leareth steps on the attempted spike of PANIC and tries to smile at the man who is apparently Lucy's brother. :I arrived here by accident from a different world. I have Mindspeech but as Lucy pointed out, it would help if I also knew the local language: 

"Mindspeech," he tries out the word. "Alright. That will work." He bows and offers Leareth a chair. 

Leareth nods. Sits. 

:Lucy?: he adds, privately to just her. :Are you leaving - how far -?: 

"I'll be right here," she clarifies. Some other scientists enter the room and she beams and waves at them. 

:Oh. All right: 

He tries his best to focus on her brother for his language lesson. 

Her brother is patient, saying words out loud and thinking their meanings clearly, then asking Leareth to repeat them. 

Leareth spoke a lot of languages, back in Velgarth; he can manage nearly all the phonemes without difficulty. He has a very good memory, and asks for pauses to take notes on especially key bits, phonetically using the Rethwellani alphabet since he doesn't know the letter-sound correspondences for the English alphabet yet.