Upon waking, Joel felt as if he had somehow been reborn, the unmistakable sensation of having crossed an invisible threshold. It wasn't simple rest, nor the natural consequence of an intense night. It was something deeper, as if a crack that had been widening within his mind for weeks had suddenly been sealed.

  He lay motionless in bed, his gaze fixed on the ceiling. He breathed deeply. The air was clean, without the constant pressure that had accompanied him since he began opening and closing that emotional barrier. There were no sharp pains, no feeling of being on the verge of something unstable. Only clarity.

  The memory of the previous night quickly settled with absolute clarity, while he lay naked on the bed. Just inches away from him, also naked, slept Ciliren.

  The thought alone was enough to send a wave of warmth through his body. He could still perceive that faint, sweet scent that seemed to emanate naturally from her skin. It wasn't perfume. It was something natural… and that his mind immediately associated with what had happened.

  He closed his eyes for a moment. None of it made sense. He had never felt anything like this in his life, not even in the lives he had dreamed of. For him, romantic relationships had a kind of structure and purpose, sometimes a bit complicated from an emotional point of view, but they had logic in the end. However, what had happened with the elf woman the night before seemed more like an extreme event where they were both possessed.

  An impulse so overwhelming that it nullified any rational barrier. During those moments, the world was reduced to a single certainty: being with her. As if something deeper than willpower had taken control.

  And the unsettling thing was that it hadn't been one-sided, because Ciliren responded with the same intensity. With the same urgency. Not from resignation, but from an equally overwhelming desire. It didn't feel normal, but at the same time, it seemed completely natural.

  From the first moment he saw her, he knew there was something different about her. A subtle resonance existed between them, impossible to describe. Perhaps it had something to do with her magical affinity, or something more complex that he didn't yet understand. Her beauty certainly played a significant role in the attraction… but that didn't explain the complete loss of control.

  Joel let out a slow sigh and turned his head. Ciliren was asleep with her back to him. Her figure, completely naked, seemed sculpted with an almost unreal delicacy. Her golden hair fell loosely over her shoulders and part of her face.

  His gaze slowly traveled over her body: the smooth line of her back, the curve of her hips, the elegant length of her legs down to her small, delicate feet.

  Everything was too suggestive for him, especially when he smelled her body scent more strongly, while he spotted the bloodstains on the bed, irrefutable proof that it had been her first time.

  A different feeling crept into the serenity he had just regained. Not regret… but a heavier conscience. What had happened had been mutual, yes, but also abrupt, uncontrollable, and too primal for someone who had always been guided by logic.

  Careful not to wake her, he slowly sat up. He took a blanket and gently covered her body, making sure not to disturb her rest.

  He remained there for a few seconds, observing her. Her breathing was calm, and there was no tension in her features. That gave him a small measure of relief.

  He slowly moved away from the bed, walked to the adjoining bathroom, and gently closed the door behind him. Standing in front of the mirror, he placed both hands on the sink and looked at himself. In the reflection, he saw a somewhat different face, without dark circles or tension.

  "Nana, are you there?" he murmured softly.

  In a matter of seconds, one of the bathroom walls rippled as if the wood had turned to liquid, and from it emerged Nana's metallic figure, passing through the wall without any resistance. Wooden tentacles unfurled with a soft creak, anchoring themselves to the ceiling and walls, holding her suspended in the air like a puppet.

  Joel was already waiting for her. "Do you know what might have happened last night?" he asked, not giving her time to speak.

  The statue barely tilted its head. Its lifeless eyes examined him for a couple of seconds, as if processing an unexpected anomaly.

  “It’s perfectly clear what happened last night,” she replied in a neutral voice. “I’m baffled that you’re asking me that question.”

  Joel frowned, and the tension in his jaw betrayed his discomfort. “I’m referring to my complete loss of judgment,” he clarified, letting out a breath in exasperation. “Didn’t you feel anything strange? You could have stopped me. What if I had been under the influence of some poison? Or a hallucinogen? What if I was really in danger?”

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  Nana showed no emotion. “Nothing that happened posed a risk to you,” she replied with calculated coldness. “If anyone was in danger, it was that woman. The way you treated her was… considerably rough. Fortunately, her affinity grants her a remarkable regenerative ability. Even so, I doubt she’ll be able to walk normally today.”

  The words landed heavily on him. Guilt immediately spread across Joel’s face. “I wasn’t in control of myself,” he muttered, almost to himself.

  “That doesn’t change the fact that you did it,” Nana replied without raising her voice. “I tried to communicate with you several times, but I didn’t get a response from you. Between your own moans and hers, you probably didn’t even hear me.”

  A chill ran down Joel’s neck. Shame was unavoidable.

  Before he could reply, the statue continued, “Having said that, I also kept a close eye on the situation. What happened between you two was… worthy of study.”

  Joel looked up, confused. "What do you mean?"

  For the first time, the metallic face showed something akin to bewilderment. “Still don’t you realize it?” it asked. “You’re on the verge of breaking through the barrier of your current level. In a single night, you advanced what would normally require years of sustained mana growth.”

  The revelation hit him like a sledgehammer. Joel immediately closed his eyes and turned his awareness inward. The flow of mana within his body no longer felt the same. The density had changed. It was more compact, heavier, more stable. The pressure was building at the center, dangerously close to the critical point needed to ascend. Level five, the frontier so many mages never reached.

  He opened his eyes slowly, still processing what he had just discovered. “This is making less and less sense…” he murmured, almost in a whisper.

  “Even more so when you consider that the elf woman also benefited,” Nana added in her usual neutral tone. “She ascended directly to level three of her power scale.” A mystical expert, to be more specific.

  Joel's eyes widened in disbelief. The shock was so abrupt that he even took a small step back. "Are you serious?"

  "Absolutely. During the more than five hours that you remained together, I clearly perceived how the energy in both of you increased at an alarming rate. It was a phenomenon that contradicts almost everything I know about the behavior of mana and energy… not taking into account my own nature, of course.”

  The silence that followed was thick. Joel turned his gaze to the mirror above the sink. His reflection watched him with a serenity he didn't feel inside. At first glance, there were no obvious changes, but he knew something inside him had been altered. He felt it like a constant pressure, as if the mana at his core were about to overflow. Questions began to pile up in his mind, one after another.

  "If I had to venture a theory…" he finally said, after a long period of analysis, "I'd say it's related to my body. Especially after having gone through Ashoka's Nirvana. Or perhaps it has to do with my strange power."

  Nana tilted her metallic face slightly. "It's a reasonable hypothesis. Your body contains an unusual amount of natural energy. It could have generated a synergy with the elf woman's life affinity. You both possess a type of regeneration, so it's possible you're connected somehow."

  Joel nodded slowly. “That’s what I thought too… but there’s also the fact that she was the first woman I’ve ever been with. That might have been a determining factor. Likewise, perhaps only one of us is the real catalyst.”

  “Then we need more data,” Nana concluded without hesitation. “More experiments that allow us to isolate variables. We must determine under what conditions the phenomenon occurs and whether it’s repeatable.”

  Joel nodded automatically, still lost in thought. Until he grasped the true weight of those last words.

  He glanced slowly. “Are you implying what I think you said?” he asked, his tone firmer.

  The statue showed no doubt. “What’s wrong with that? You both seemed to enjoy it. There were no signs of rejection. If repeating the process increases your power, the logical thing to do is test it. With her… and with other women, to compare results.”

  Nana’s cold pragmatism was almost cutting.

  “That’s anything but ethical,” Joel retorted sternly. “From multiple perspectives.”

  There was a brief silence.

  “Ethical?” Nana repeated, with a slight inflection that bordered on sarcasm. “Says the one who ordered dismemberments and used human bodies as energy batteries. The one who didn’t hesitate to authorize torture and experiments when he deemed it necessary.”

  The words hit him harder than he expected. Joel pressed his lips together. “That was different,” he replied, though his voice lacked its usual conviction. “Those were necessary decisions in an extreme situation. For our safety.”

  “And isn’t this?” Nana countered. “Increasing your power should be our absolute priority. Every advance increases our chances of survival.”

  The statue's tone grew more serious. "You have several women at the shelter who could volunteer. Ariel, for example, has shown consistent interest in you. She would be the most motivated."

  Joel let out a long, heavy sigh, as if trying to release the pressure building in his chest.

  "I still don't know what you really are," he said, without taking his eyes off the mirror. "But what I do know is that you're not human. And you don't understand how complex social interactions can be... or the consequences they carry. I can't go around fornicating with anyone who crosses my path. That could end up being worse for my own mental health."

  There was frustration in his voice, but also something deeper: uncertainty. Although part of him was beginning to distance himself from the memories of his dreams, Earth's influence remained alive within him. Not only the ancient, pragmatic culture, but also the more modern versions, with their emotional codes, their romantic ideals, and their moral contradictions. Within him coexisted multiple ethical frameworks, some even contradictory, and this constant friction forced him to question himself more than he would have liked.

  His new state of mind—lighter and more uninhibited—had no qualms about acting swiftly. In other circumstances, what had happened with Ciliren might have taken him weeks to reflect on before he allowed it. Now it had occurred almost as a natural force, without filters or reservations. But it was one thing to be guided by instinct. And quite another to deliberately involve other people in something that inevitably touched emotional chords.

  His encounter with Ciliren could no longer be undone. It had happened. And for him, that meant taking responsibility. Regardless of whether he had been influenced by their affinity, by Nirvana, or by some unknown magical phenomenon, his nature—that mixture of cold strategist and man molded by Earth's human values—prevented him from pretending nothing had happened. It wasn't as simple as repeating an experiment.

  Joel closed his eyes for a moment. He didn't know how to handle a possible romantic relationship with the elf woman. The physical attraction was undeniable; almost overwhelming. But beyond that… he barely knew her. He didn't know what she feared, what she desired, what she expected from him. He didn't know if the previous night had meant the same thing to her as it had to him… or something entirely different.

  Perhaps he was overthinking it. Perhaps for Ciliren, it didn't carry the weight he imagined. Perhaps, in her culture, in her experience, the act didn't involve promises or invisible bonds.

  Or perhaps Nana was right. Perhaps he should stop getting tangled up in moral dilemmas and take advantage of any opportunity fate offered him.

  The problem was that, no matter how hard he tried to convince himself of this, something inside him resisted. And that something wasn't about to be silenced so easily.