Answer:
prefixes
Explanation:
The exact response will depend a lot on what you learned in your manual and the terms used in it, but the metric system is all based on the base of 10, like the numbers system you use every day.
Unlike the US/Imperial system where there's no clear relation between an inch, a yard and a mile for example, in the metric system everything is related by the factor 10 somehow.
The unit multiplier is also used as a prefix to identify measurements. Like for meter...
10 meters = 1 decameter
100 meters = 1 hectometer
1000 meters = 1 kilometer
and so on.