Oberon followed after Mourningstar as she led their little group towards the bonfire, his mind still preoccupied with the results of his last bit of experimentation. The combination of Mana Shot and Shield hadn’t worked nearly how he had expected, but if anything the result was more interesting that what he had been trying to achieve; the ability to create a free standing forcefield, even just in the form of a spherical barrier, would be quite useful if he could turn it into a spell. He would have to try again later and see what he could come up with, plus he had more ideas on how to potentially improve his Mana Shot, not to mention working towards creating an improved healing spell and playing around more with the system messages and menus he had found earlier…

Oberon stopped just before running into the back of Digbie and looked up to find that the group had stopped for some reason. Ahead of them he could now see the flames of the bonfire first hand, though he had seen its illumination from his crevice even if he didn’t know what it was. According to Mourningstar it was a place of congregation for a number of the monsters that dwelled in the cave, making it an ideal place to find others and a questionable place to hunt.

Currently, Mourningstar was hovering in front of them while waving a mana crystal in front of her like a baton, or at least that’s what he thought she was doing, and laying out her plan of action. As he’d kind of feared and expected, the plan wasn’t exactly awe inspiring and the whole thing gave Oberon pause for concern. In the Wisps defence there wasn’t necessarily anything wrong with the plan, finding any other people from Earth and having backup waiting in the wings should anything go wrong, but the execution seemed overly ambitious, rushed and presumptuous. Luckily she was asking for their input, though he wasn’t sure how well she would take it.

As he thought about what he was going to say Oberon cast a shield spell on Mourningstar as instructed. Casting the spell in addition to his earlier efforts depleted his mana reserves, prompting a system message to appear, so he popped one of the mana crystals he was holding to replenish his MP.

As he did so Orochi stepped forward and raised a valid point about the number of Goblins around the bonfire, which was one of the main concerns he himself had, because it didn’t sound like Mourningstar was taking that into account.

[color=f49ac2]“Yeah, ok. I have several things to add to that. Firstly, are you sure you want to go out there alone? I could go with you; I could back you up, add another voice to your speech. It might help to show whoever's down there that you aren’t alone; both so that people don’t think it’s just you they are joining up with and also to deter anyone from attacking you.”[/color] Also, he didn’t want to say it but the Wisp didn’t exactly give the best first impression. If she was going to try and ‘recruit’ people in her usual grand fashion it could do more harm than good.

With his mana replenished Oberon turned and also cast a Shield on Digbie and Orochi; hopefully they wouldn’t need it but it wouldn’t hurt to make sure everyone was protected. He began to cast a Shield on himself as well, only to hesitate as he remembered his newly upgraded Magic Analysis skill; as he cast a Shield around himself he made sure to look down as he pressed a hand to his chest, trying to observe the way the mana behaved as the spell activated.

[color=f49ac2]“Before we do anything though, I think we should take a look and see just how many Goblins or other monsters are around the bonfire. If there are too many we should just forget about this whole plan. We might be smarter than the average monster around here and maybe stronger as well, but let’s not get too overconfident.”[/color]

[@Zeroth][@floodtalon][@CriticalHit][@Gardevoiran]