The Spider Queen

(Zrudread University Main Campus)

(Elite Student Housing Complex- Mansion 456 Y)

It was a beautiful day.

The elite student housing complex was an area of land with several massive villas built a short distance away from each other.

It was here where the elite class students were housed and could enjoy comforts and privileges not given to the other students in the university.

Sophie held Cleo's hand as the pair walked towards a massive three-story building that was only a few meters away.

The hybrid girl would occasionally stop to press a kiss against Cleo's cheek and enjoyed watching her girlfriend blush.

Cleo was finally back.

Sophie could not stop herself from taking constant glances at her girlfriend as if to make sure that she was still there.

"Do I have something on my face?" Cleo teased softly as she leaned in closer.

"No… you are as beautiful as always, my princess," Sophie replied with a warm smile as she stroked Cleo's back.

Sophie approached the scanner next to the entrance to their mansion and lightly pressed her hand against the screen.

A green light flashed twice and then the metalloid door swung open to reveal the familiar interior of their mansion.

Sophie led Cleo to the living room and sat down her girlfriend on the couch before finally letting go of her hand.

"Stay right there… I got a special surprise…" Sophie teased as she rushed off to the kitchen.

Cleo smiled gently as she waited for her girlfriend to return. It was cute how excited she sometimes got.

The hybrid girl quickly arrived in the kitchen and headed for the oven. As the saying went...

'The only way to a person's heart was through their stomach!'

Sophie was not exactly the best cook, but she could easily make delicious desserts full of sugary goodness.

She opened up the oven and took out a small tray where a large gooey cake jiggling slightly from side to side rested on its surface.

One of Sui Meng's memories contained a recipe for a simple chocolate cake and Sophie had modified the formula to make it even sweeter.

Cultivators at their level no longer had to worry about blood pressure or developing cavities so Sophie was quite generous with the sugar that she poured in the cake batter.

Sophie grabbed a knife from one of the drawers and two plates.

She carefully cut the cake into multiple pieces and placed three slices on each plate.

She held the plates in her hand and walked back to the living room. She placed the food down on the table in front of the couch and then prepared to sit down next to Cleo.

"Oh wait… I forgot the spoons!" Sophie exclaimed in shock. She ran back to the kitchen and grabbed two plastic spoons.

When she returned Cleo was already eating the cake using her fingers. The corners of the princess' mouth had small chocolate crumbs but in Sophie's eyes it made her seem adorable.

"Wow… this is delicious!" Cleo whispered softly as she grabbed another piece. Sophie smiled proudly and handed her a spoon.

"Thanks babe! I made it using an old recipe," Sophie bragged as she placed one arm around Cleo's shoulders.

The pair made light conversation for several minutes while avoiding the topic of Cleo's experiences over the last few days.

They had already talked over the communicator and Sophie did not want to bring up their conversations… at least for now.

However, Cleo had no problem with mentioned the one issue that was still at the back of her mind.

"By the way… I didn't mention it over the Virtual Net, but I have something important to tell you," Cleo solemnly spoke.

"During the battle one of my eyes started to glow pink just like yours. I felt a constant surge of energy flowing through my body which replenished my mental energy."

"Really? That explains it then. When I was training Moon in the park… it felt as though my qi was getting sucked away to an unknown location," Sophie replied with furrowed brows.

"That's strange… did you know that you could do that before?"

"No… it was the first time that I've used the connection between us for anything other than sharing memories or communication," Cleo explained as she continued to eat.

"Maybe we should test it out tomorrow? Or should we wait until the end of the battle ranking exam?"

"I'd say to put it off until after the tournament. Usually, my powers come with some kind of backlash, so we need to be careful," Sophie warned sternly.

Cleo nodded in understanding and the pair returned to lighter topics of conversation.

Sophie talked about her experiences during the combat beast pet exam where Professor Ward had made her students control their pets to travel through a maze.

What was difficult about the exam were the hidden enemies that roamed through the maze and the endless labyrinth of side passageways and dead ends.

There were multiple ways to deal with the enemies and the professor graded the students differently depending on their method.

Some students used their pets to engage with the enemies directly while others used stealth or avoidance tactics to sneak by.

Moon used a mixture of both since Sophie at the time was commanding him with thoughts of Cleo's safety still occupying a lot of her thoughts.

It was fortunate that the months of training that Sophie had put Moon through during the semester paid off handsomely.

He was unable to grab the top spot but was able to secure a place in the upper middle ranking of the class.

"So… basically I gave Moon a few days off to relax before we start training together for the tournament," Sophie continued her story.

"Professor Macabre spoke to me privately yesterday and told me not to use my venom glands to enhance my poison."

"Apparently it may put my classmates in serious danger so I'm still on the fence whether I'll use poison at all or just fight normally."

"Yeah… there are serious limitations on what cultivation techniques students can use during the tournament," Cleo replied with a small yawn.

"I mean the assassination class specialises in killing techniques so most of them end up skipping the tournament since they can't use them."

"And then for us mech controllers… we can't use our mechs, so it comes down to only using psychic techniques."