Ssarak nodded to Aruna. He did acknowledge that the Forest Elf at least seemed to be trying to help, so her intentions were at least positive. However, Ssarak was well aware that intentions did not excuse one's actions. Were intentions all that mattered, then he would be a hero to his people, instead of an exile and a murderer. He was a living example of how the greatest evils could be committed with the best of intentions. 

As Aruna left to refill her bowl, Ssarak finished off one of his steaks and moved on to the seafood. He looked around at the crowd as he ate, trying to distract himself from the rather depressing line of thought his mind seemed to be going down. There were so many different people of all shapes and sizes; there were races that he had never seen before, and others he had never even heard of. Humans and Elves, Esyire and Half-Snakes, walking plants and Winged Humans, all of these beings and more were crowding the dining hall; he simply could not tell which were of the races of Tien, and which were demons. In this environment, that line was blurred beyond recognition. 

Unfortunately, while Ssarak was observing the crowd around him, he became distracted and one of the inherent abilities of his mageblood slipped into action. Suddenly, his mind started reaching out to those around him, reading into their thoughts. For the most part, he felt the emotions and inclinations of those around him without mental barriers, [i]all[/i] of them. All of the joy, sadness, curiosity, pride, anger, pleasure, pain, hope, and regret. All of it swarmed his mind at once, overwhelming all of his senses. There were some words mixed in with the emotions as well, but with the sheer number of people around him, they all jumbled together into incoherent noise, like everyone in the room was shouting in his ear all at once. All of this combined gave him a massive, splitting headache, causing him to lean forward onto his hands as he closed his eyes, gritted his teeth, and rubbed his temples, quite obviously in pain. For the moment, he was unresponsive as he tried his best to attempt to reign in his blood and stop the mass of voices from assaulting his mind.