The university main hall felt louder than usual afterward while hundreds of student voices echoed endlessly beneath towering marble ceilings and massive glass windows glowing pale beneath the gray morning sky, and despite sunlight pouring softly across polished floors the atmosphere carried something sharp and ugly hidden beneath ordinary campus noise.
Judgment.
Whispers.
Cruel curiosity spreading faster than truth ever could.
Elara stepped through the enormous entrance doors afterward while cold exhaustion lingered visibly beneath silver-gray eyes now, and the very instant her heels touched polished marble silence spread unnaturally fast through the crowded hall before conversations erupted again louder than before.
Not normal conversations anymore.
About her.
Always about her now.
Students stared openly afterward while glowing phone screens reflected brightly through the busy hall now beneath hanging chandeliers and drifting morning light.
Photographs everywhere.
