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Although the Veyn Empire had always insisted on promoting the Marcan language family in its colonies, Marcan was still only one of the world’s commonly used languages, rather than the only one. For example, in the region where Darkmoon Island was located, the official language was not Marcan, but Siderson.
Even within the same language family, differences in regional cultures could produce extremely distinct linguistic traits, let alone the vast disparities brought about by entirely different language families and the cultures behind them.
Some locally flavored greetings were not merely dialectal differences, but closer to trade jargon or even coded speech used by different groups and professions. When phrases such as “The pagoda suppresses the river demon,” or “The ridge rises high and shakes the land, a single stream and mountain remains in timeless beauty,” were translated literally, they often strayed far from their intended meaning, sometimes to the point of being completely misleading.
It was like the comment Karon had once made using the word “grounded.” Only Alfred had grasped its true meaning, while to Pu’er and Kevin’s ears, as well as those they shared the comment with, Karon’s words had sounded more like “to connect with the breath and will of the earth,” which leaned heavily in the direction of the doctrine of the Mother of Earth.
Of course, Pu’er was not trying to set Karon up. There was no reason for her to dig a pit for her own great-great-great-great grandniece. The real reason was that, for the sake of sour pickled fish, Pu'er had racked her brains and told Karon everything she could possibly scrape together from her memories about Darkmoon Island.
That included a memory from long ago, where beneath the light of the setting sun, a handsome young master had looked at her face and said, "It is the mottled afterglow beneath the Darkmoon that has allowed me to behold your true self.”
In return for the man’s deep feelings of that moment, the girl had remained completely unmoved, and had even asked in an extremely perfunctory tone, "Oh? What does that mean?"
The young master's expression had dimmed in disappointment, but he had forced himself to explain. "It is just an ordinary greeting we use on Darkmoon Island when meeting friends."
Pu'er had passed both that line and that explanation on...
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