Chapter 170: Destined

Chapter 170: Chapter 170: Destined

In a room on the second floor of White Oak Manor, morning sunlight streamed through a gap in the curtains, falling upon a soft, large bed.

Cecilia’s long eyelashes trembled slightly, and then she slowly opened her eyes.

The first thing she felt upon regaining consciousness was not the exhaustion from depleting her Spiritual Power.

Quite the opposite, it was the immense Magic Power within her, so full it felt like it was about to overflow.

Her once-depleted Magic Circuits now felt like riverbeds nourished by spring rain. Not only were they filled to their absolute limit with Magic Power, but even her nerve endings were constantly sending a tingling sensation to her brain that made her scalp prickle.

The feeling was so comfortable that she couldn’t help but let out a soft, sweet hum into her pillow, like a little kitten just waking up.

"Water..."

After that brief moment of comfort, she suddenly felt a burning in her throat, and her lips were uncomfortably dry.

She subconsciously turned her head.

And met Yuna’s sparkling eyes, which were staring at her from the bedside like a pair of searchlights.

"Thank goodness you’re finally awake, you sleepyhead!"

Yuna let out a long sigh of relief, deftly turning to grab a glass of warm water she had prepared earlier from the table, and carefully brought it to her roommate’s lips.

Cecilia was absolutely parched.

Cupping the glass with both hands, she gulped the water down.

The warm water soothed her dry, hoarse throat, and her brain, which had been in a state of shutdown, began to quickly replay what had happened.

Fragments of memory from the Projection Space flooded into her mind like a tidal wave.

Dark Gold vertical pupils... scorching heat... clinging desperately to Lance’s neck... the image of her licking...

As these high-definition images replayed in her mind like a revolving lantern, that intense, electric pleasure shot through her body like a current once more.

"COUGH, COUGH, COUGH!"

The immense shock of the memory made Cecilia suddenly choke on a mouthful of water.

She began to cough violently, and her entire fair face flushed bright red in just two seconds.

The alarming blush spread all the way to her hairline, instantly turning the pointed ears hiding in her silver hair the color of ripe tomatoes.

’Oh heavens! Oh heavens!’

Cecilia screamed frantically in her mind, on the verge of a breakdown.

’What have I done?!’

’Lance must think I’m a shameless Half-Elf now!’

’My father’s strict teachings, the noble dignity the Rosenthal Family prides itself on—I personally tore it all to shreds last night!’

The girl sorrowfully closed her eyes.

’How am I ever going to face Lance again?!’

"Cecilia? Do you have a fever? Why is there steam coming out of your head?!"

Yuna narrowed her eyes and leaned in, her expression suspicious.

Drawing upon her vast experience from reading countless romance novels, the roommate immediately smelled something amiss.

’Something is very wrong!’

’This blushing face and evasive gaze!’

A classic scene from *The Flirtatious Earl and the Elf Maid* flashed through Yuna’s mind.

After experiencing a certain indescribable intimate encounter for the first time, the heroine of the novel would wake up the next morning looking exactly this mortified and indignant!

Yuna grabbed Cecilia’s shoulders, her voice filled with unconcealed excitement and a thirst for gossip.

"Spill it. What exactly did you and Lance get up to, just the two of you alone in that Projection Space?"

"N-nothing!"

The question made Cecilia shudder. She subconsciously pulled the soft blanket up, hiding the lower half of her face.

But her watery red eyes, peeking out from over the blanket, and her trembling, unconvincing voice completely betrayed the panic in her heart.

Yuna stared intently at her roommate’s pointed ears, which were so red they looked like they might start bleeding.

Suddenly, a bolt of lightning-like inspiration struck Yuna.

She forcefully pieced together the plots from her novels with Cecilia’s strange behavior over the past few days, and a bold hypothesis surfaced.

’This reaction... there’s no mistaking it...’

Yuna let go of her, shouting, "Don’t you move! Wait for me!"

With that, she spun around with a SWOOSH and dashed out of the bedroom like a gust of wind.

Cecilia, left on the bed, had no idea what was going on.

She could only maintain her defensive posture, clutching the blanket and staring blankly at the white ceiling.

The intimate, searing images from yesterday continued to play on a loop in the young woman’s mind.

Not even half a minute later, Yuna rushed back in, a whirlwind of motion.

She was hugging a heavy academic book on Sub-human Species.

Panting, she quickly flipped through the table of contents and soon found the Chapter on the physiological characteristics of Half-Elves.

"I knew it! I knew this book would have something about it!"

Yuna slapped a hand on the book’s page and shouted excitedly.

"Half-Elves, just like Pure-blood Elves, all have a Flowering Stage!"

Yuna slammed the heavy book down on the nightstand. 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

She put her hands on her hips, looking down at the girl on the bed.

"Cecilia, I’m going to ask you a few questions, and you have to swear on the Goddess Aretia that you’ll answer me honestly!"

"W-what questions?" Cecilia timidly peeked her head out.

Yuna pointed a finger at her roommate’s forehead, her tone like that of a seasoned constable interrogating a suspect.

"Lately, whenever you get close to Lance, does your skin get uncontrollably hot?"

"And the places where he’s accidentally touched you—even after a whole night has passed, can you still clearly feel that strange tingling sensation?"

Hearing these two incredibly precise questions, Cecilia’s already flushed ears instantly turned an even deeper shade of red.

She felt a mortifying sense of shame, as if her deepest, most hidden secret had been stripped bare by her roommate in public.

"You... How do you know all this?! Have I really been that obvious?!"

Hearing this answer, Yuna got so excited she slapped her own thigh.

"It’s not about how obvious you’ve been! It’s that you, you dummy, have no idea what’s happening to your own body!"

Yuna shoved the academic book right into Cecilia’s arms.

"Cecilia, you entered the Half-Elf’s unique Flowering Stage a long time ago!"

"The Flowering Stage?"

Cecilia was completely stunned.

For a Half-Elf, the Flowering Stage arrives much earlier than for a Pure-blood Elf, and it lasts for a very short time.

In her aunt’s Elf Race worldview, someone Cecilia’s age was still just a child, so she had never explained this dangerous physiological phenomenon—one related to lifespan and reproduction—in detail.

"See for yourself what the book says."

At this point, Cecilia couldn’t be bothered with being shy anymore.

She quickly sat up straight and lowered her head, starting to seriously read the dense text on the page.

"According to academic research, during the Flowering Stage, if an Elf encounters someone with whom they can achieve soul resonance, their body will uncontrollably develop skin hunger!"

Yuna’s finger was so animated with excitement it nearly poked Cecilia on her cute, upturned nose.

"Think back on it yourself—all your abnormal physical reactions lately."

"You weren’t sick at all! It’s because your soul had already secretly chosen Lance!"

"Your body craves his touch, it craves his scent—it’s all a physiological instinct brought on by the compatibility of your souls!"

"I... crave him..."

Cecilia stared blankly, holding the heavy book, and whispered the words softly.

"The book spells it out clearly."

Yuna went ahead and sat cross-legged on the bed, taking on the role of a temporary lecturer.

"When it comes to choosing a partner during the Flowering Stage, it has nothing to do with background, looks, or wealth."

"It’s not a choice based on psychology or physiology—it’s a destiny decreed by the soul."

"You could even say that from the very moment your soul was born, it was destined to be intensely drawn to another, completely different soul."

Yuna paused for a moment before delivering her final summary.

"So, here’s a bold theory."

"The moment you arrived in Gray Rock Town on your first day, when your eyes met Lance’s in the Adventurer’s Guild."

"Cecilia, you could say that the gears of fate had already started turning, and your Flowering Stage had begun."