Adriana was deep in meditation. As she exhaled mana pulsed through her palms into the leather she was using to wrap the handle of Darius’ saber. The weapon was pretty much complete. She inlaid more durability to the weapon by slipping mana into the slots between the molecules of iron. The blade had a slight glow to it from the mana that was now bound to it. This wasn’t a permanent solution seeing as some of the mana would be stripped away with every use of the weapon, but it was a great test of her ability to augment equipment with mana using her knowledge from her engineering discipline. This would also make up for the poor quality of metal she was forced to work with. When the weapon was finished she placed it in the sheath and hip belt she created for it.

With her work for the day completed she cleaned up her work station, and grabbed the newly finished weapon. “I can’t wait to show the guys my handy work,” Adriana said out loud as she started to skip away from the workstations. Before she could even get far away from the makeshift canopy she noticed that Elana, Darius, and X were running in her direction. ‘Did X tell them about the weapon, or is there something wrong?’ As they got closer she could see the serious expression on Elana’s face. From what she knew about Elana so far a look like that meant something was seriously wrong.

“What happened guys?” Adriana asked.

“Zack is in trouble,” Elana blurted out all at once. “We need your help to save him.”

“I guess my timing on finishing this was good then,” Adriana said as she tossed the bundle of weapon and sheath to Darius. “Let's get a move on then.” Adriana didn’t need to hear anything else. She has worked too hard in preparation for this mission for any of her friends to die. She wouldn’t let them so long as she had a say in the matter.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On their way back to camp things were mostly quiet. The sun was pretty much gone at this point, but they were able to make it back to a familiar landmark. The mushroom forest was a sight for sore eyes.

“It is good that we got our barings back when we did,” Mike said. “I don’t think I could have remembered the direction in the dark. It is difficult to see the hill from the treeline.”

“I never thought about the fact that we could have just climbed a tree to get our bearings if we needed to,” Norman said.

“Isn’t that kinda dangerous in the dark?” Zack questioned.

“So is fighting goblins,” Norman replied almost automatically.

“You’ve got a point there,” Mike chuckled. “Thinking back to it, they said that goblins spawn from spaces like the inside of that cave system we found earlier, right?”

“That’s what it felt like Varlushia was trying to express,” Zack said. “It was also possible she doesn’t know if those places are more like their home, or if they just pop out of the ground there. The ability to speak with mana is limited to what the other party knows.”

“Fair enough,” Mike responded. “I’m more interested in how long it takes them to have another fighting force like that build up.”

“I will ask when we come back,” Zack mumbled.

“What do you mean when we come back?” Norman was flabbergasted. “You mean to tell me that we have to come back here? I am all for going out and fighting enemies in the wild, but going to another group that we don’t know’s turf sounds like it could lead to a lot of problems.”

“Well how else did you think we would find out more about this world? We have to do this mission in order to get home, we may as well mingle with the locals while we are at it.” Zack was confused by Norman’s desire to go out and level up, but not learn about the elves.

“Whatever,” Norman said. “Just don’t blame me when it gets us killed.

The group trudged on in silence until they were at the edge of the mushroom forest. This entire time they were keeping their eyes peeled for another goblin ambush. The dark terrain made it hard to differentiate between the green of the brush, and the shades of greens and browns in goblin skin. When they reached a small clearing they stopped to rest. Their trek so far was nonstop, and it appeared to have caught up with them.

“We need to keep moving, Norman said. “Taking a break in such an open space makes us sitting ducks.”

“So does being exhausted in a forest wandering around half blind,” Mike responded. “Fatigue leads to mistakes, and mistakes get us killed. So we rest for now, and then continue walking.”

“Norman, why have you been so ancy this whole time?” Zack asked. “Usually you are a tough guy so I am not used to seeing you act like a chicken.”

“If you weren’t our team’s medic I would punch you into next week,” Norman barked. “It felt like something has been watching us since we left the cave, and I don’t like the feeling.”

Zack could feel the air around him become charged with mana. “Be on guard, something is off.”

Suddenly a bolt of mana could be seen sailing from the tree line at Zack.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“If they were out trying to take out goblins then I think I know where they would go,” Darius said matter of factly. He pulls out his map and points to a spot. “Remember the Mushroom Forest?”

“Oh yeah, that is where we first saw the goblins while we were scouting. X took a closer look at the map. “They aren’t terribly far from here if that is where they are now. Maybe we should start by searching there.”

“You read my mind,” Elana said as she led the party deeper into the forest.

In almost no time at all they were within sight of their target destination. X opened his menu to see if he could find any clues as to where they might be. That was when he noticed that Norman’s health bar dropped by 25 percent. “Guys,” X said, “not to panic you or anything, but Elan’s intuition is spot on. I just saw Norman take a lot of damage. We need to find them now.”

The party kicked it into high gear and jogged towards the Mushroom Forest.