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You've reached Frisk. If I'm not answering my phone, please leave a message or find me on the second floor, Room 12.

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[She grins.]

You want to learn the swear words first or last?

[Frisk snorts, giggling.]

How - how bad are they?

Basic ones aren't too bad. Lots of cursing ancestors. 他妈的, it's the most common one, cursing some nebulous mother. [Like Mom? ...Let's ignore that for now.] Follow the tone, too, 's important, or else you're saying something else. Tā māde. Now you say it.

[Oh wow. They're about to learn a language. And they're about to learn - bad words in that language. Frisk sits up straight, attentive, and tries to sound out the words in the same way River said them.]

Ta...mah-deh?

Not deh, like duh, it's... It's kinda like saying "tomato" funny. Tā māde.

[They try it again, stretching the words thoughtfully.]

Tā māde. And that means, like...like saying son of a...

[Frisk coughs, too embarrassed to finish the phrase.]

[Frisk almost swears in English, and River bursts into a fit of giggles.]

Yeah, yeah, it's the same! But you say it for everything! 他妈的, I stubbed my toe! 他妈的, I'm caught in the event horizon!

[She stifles more giggles.]

I'll teach you more than swears. You can learn all about tones! Have to pay attention to tone, because tone is the difference between Mom and a horse. Māma mà mǎ. "Mom scolds the horse". Same pronunciation, different tone. Makes a tongue twister.

[They bite back an undignified snort. Swearing in another language is easier, absurd as it sounds to put it like that. River said no one seems to speak Mandarin here, so no one would know what they were saying, and they wouldn't get in trouble! It's a perfect solution.

Frisk wrinkles their nose at the subtle variations in the pronunciation.]

So I might end up saying "son of a horse" instead, because of my tone?

Exactly! The tone can be neutral, high, up, down, or down and up. So pay close attention when you repeat words.

Hmm... Prob'ly a Mandarin grammar book in the library. Can teach you out of that. I've never tutored anyone before. Corrected homework, but not as a teacher.

Yeah. I...think I'd like that. I like to read anyway.

[It'd be like having a friend. They are friends. And they can teach each other stuff, the way friends do.]

[And maybe she can manage to enter the library again now that everything is fine between her and Frisk.]

We'll leave writing and reading hànzì for after you know the words, though. Might be too hard otherwise. It's not like the English alphabet.

Is it...big? I mean, bigger than twenty-six letters?

[And here they'd been hoping they could find a translation dictionary and start there, but it doesn't sound as immediately intuitive as they might have thought.]

Much bigger. Tens of thousands of them. They're each a word, or two or more are a word. But don't be scared. You won't have to learn all of them. Just the ones you'll use.

[Their eyes widen at that. Tens of thousands of letters?]

Just...just the important ones. Got it.

[They nod. They can do this, though. They're determined.]

You'll learn quick. I have confidence in you. [Pat pat.]

[Frisk grins, pleased, filled with the warmth of...accomplishment. It's a feeling they haven't processed in a while, they think.]

Thanks, River.

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[action] for fun i tried to read this aloud and instantly remembered i cant speak chinese

[action] whoda thunk

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