Outsiders

"Interesting."

The fact the king fish communicated this particular meaning spoke much about what it knew and how it regarded the human visitors.

Ves and the others had constructed numerous different mental models of the king fish's personality and cognition.

Most of them assumed that the king fish and the fish-whale race as a whole were completely insular and unaware of the outside cosmos. Purgatory was their entire universe and the concept that races other than the fish-whales could exist should be nonexistent.

An individual's knowledge and views shaped their vocabulary. The king fish shouldn't be able to communicate word 'outsiders' unless it had a clear idea that there was life outside of this phase whale enclave!

Ves rapidly made a few conclusions based on these thoughts and adjusted his strategy.