Christina's POV
The world spun in a hazy blur, colors bleeding into one another like a smeared painting. My head felt light, as if I were floating, untethered from the ground. I blinked, trying to focus, and there he was—a man standing before me, his silhouette sharp against the dim light of my dorm room.
My vision cleared, and my breath caught. Shennong. His broad shoulders, the chiseled line of his jaw, those piercing eyes that seemed to see right through me. My heart thudded, but something was wrong—different. The usual walls I kept around myself, the restraint, the caution… they were gone. Vanished, like smoke in the wind.
