The three slots explained

01 Slot 0: the utterance frame

Slot 0 stands at the beginning of an utterance. Its particles tell the listener how to receive the clause that follows:

• wa marks a yes/no question.
• no marks a directive, which context may make a request or command.
• lu marks a realis condition; lu he marks an irrealis one.
• su marks a wish, hope, or prayer.
• pi marks politeness.

An ordinary declarative assertion has no Slot 0 particle. When politeness combines with another frame, it comes first in the documented forms pi wa and pi no.

02 Slot 1: the verb phrase

Slot 1 stands before the verb, with any manner descriptor between the particle block and the verb. Its ranks have one fixed order:

Tense > Aspect > Voice > Evidentiality > Modality > Negation

The inventory is closed:

• Tense: past to, future so; present is unmarked.
• Aspect: complete ki, ongoing si, beginning pa, ending te, habitual ro.
• Voice: passive se, causative ka; the one permitted same-rank pair is se ka.
• Evidentiality: witnessed hi, inferred ke, reported ti, assumed ho.
• Modality: possible or able po, necessary na.
• Negation: ma.

Each rank admits at most one choice in a clause, apart from se ka. Two sources need two clauses, and two aspects need two views of the event. The order gives the listener a stable parse without ranking tense as more objective than source or negation as more subjective than voice.

03 Slot 2: a constituent

Slot 2 particles stand directly before the word or phrase they modify. They may occur around a noun, a predicate, or another constituent:

• lo marks unquantified plurality, and nu marks ordinal position.
• ko marks focus; we adds a constituent; li restricts one.
• mo forms a comparative, while mo ko forms a superlative; ru intensifies.
• ha and ra mark proximal and distal reference.
• ne introduces a name atom; sa, ni, and le mark named relationships.

Slot 2 particles nest by scope. Wider relations come earlier: we or li, then ha or ra, then lo or a numeral, then ko, then ru or mo, then the content word. The proper-name and ordinal pairs keep their own local orders: ne precedes an honorific, and nu precedes its numeral.

04 All three in one sentence

pi wa thia lo melu so nila. — Will you please see the friends?

The structure is:

Without a particle, no hidden claim appears. mia thia nila. means "I see you" in the present; source, aspect, modality, and negation are all unmarked. A particle appears only when the sentence needs its distinction.