The first nightmare Lucia had ever experienced was during her seventh birthday.
She was looking up above where there were hundreds of giant rock boulders ready to rain down everywhere in the land and the skies were filled with purple thunder and dark clouds.
The seven-year-old Lucia could not completely comprehend the situation during that time but she knew what would happen when the boulders fell into the land - imminent death.
Thus her seven-year-old mind was deeply shaken by these vivid dreams and when she managed to wake up, the entire Astasze estate was disturbed by her hysterical cries. Back then she also suffered a high fever and was bedridden for a couple of days, making the Marquiss Family worried about her well-being.
When she was fifteen years old, she saw the terrifying skies again, but this time she saw some oddly familiar people that increased her confusion.
Sir Eugine Farauld, the most promising apprentice knight in the Empire at the moment, the High Priests of the Temple whom she only saw whenever her parents attend a mass presided by him, and the eldest prince of the Seirende Empire, Valentin.
They didn't look young, instead, there were traces of multiple decades on their faces, but mystifyingly, Lucia in that nightmare was certain of their identity.
Their faces were filled with despair and hopelessness as they forced their bodies to stand up and pick up their weapons. Their eyes only looked towards one direction, to an enemy - an angry woman with long silky purple hair and amethyst eyes.
'Who is she? Why is she fighting with these people? She must be from a dignified noble family from the way she dressed.'
The features of the woman were buried deeply in her mind, however, everything was just an odd nightmare, she did not really take everything she saw seriously.
But little by little, she gradually realized that her dreams were oddly coincidental to what was happening in real life.
In the autumn of the same year, she dreamed of her father, the late Marquiss, planning on signing contracts with a merchant, but it turns out that the merchant group was a fraudulent business.
When she woke up the next day, during the family dinner she was shocked to hear that her father and elder brother, Jeremy, the heir to the Astaze March, was indeed about to sign a contract with the same fraudulent merchant in her dreams.
Deeply bothered by the coincidence, she immediately talked to her brother privately and told her 'gut feeling' about the merchant. Fortunately, Jeremy did not completely dismiss her words of warning but did not believe them outright either.
To ease his little sister's worries, Jeremy ordered his elite knights to conduct a secret investigation of the merchant group and had indeed found out that they were fraudulent!
Starting from then, whenever Lucia would have some odd kind of dream, she would immediately call out to her family to avoid impending disasters so much that they believed that she was a lucky charm of the Astaze March.
"Mother, at the tea party later, I advise you to refrain yourself from ridiculing the wife of the Millfort Baron."
Later after the tea party, it was announced that Baron Millfort discovered an abundant deposit of sapphire and emerald gems, one that was the largest in the Empire at that time.
"Brother, I think you need to read these books…"
After the winter break, Jeremy went straight to her and hugged her tight because of her advice. It turns out the books that she recommended were detrimental to his qualification to be one of the honored scholars in the Farauld Magic Institute.
"Father… I am feeling good about putting up an orphanage under our March. What do you think of this idea?"
It turns out that the orphans they have gathered had a strong aptitude for summoning magic and some were highly intelligent, making their Astaze March look forward to a promising future.
All this and many more, simple advice from Lucia gradually increased the influence and power of the Astaze March, so much that it was slowly becoming comparable to a ducal family.
And so they started to rely on Lucia's fortune-telling whenever they would be venturing into something new.
But that immediately stopped when another terrible dream came to her on her seventeenth birthday.
This time, not only the same horrible dream was the one she saw, it contained more than just the repetitive scene.
Sitting on the throne was no longer someone with blood-red hair and crystal blue eyes. But a pair of a man and a woman, with similar features, purple hair, and amethyst eyes.
Lucia found herself kneeling in front of them, it was so vivid and realistic that she could feel the stinging pain in her head and knees, and the cold heavy chain attached to her hands and feet.
Then on her side, she heard the sniffles of her brother's crying… he had already grown so much, and there was a delicate woman on his side, as well as a few young men that shared their features
'Could they be, elder brother's future family?' She could not help but wonder. Besides, she could no longer see her parents with them, so she had a hunch that this nightmare must have happened in the far future.
She realized that she was at the center of the square and on a nearby platform, there was a guillotine. Also, it was not only her family that was kneeling in front of the two figures, there were also other prominent families, and most of them were from the vassal families of their March!
'What is happening?' She furrowed her brows and started to get worried. As much as she wanted to convince herself that this was just a dream, there were already countless dreams that proved to be the far future ahead.
But this nightmare was too worrisome to ignore! First, this nightmare had already come to her three times. Second, unlike her previous dreams, this showed the future of the Astaze March directly.
How could she not convince herself to remember every part of this nightmare?
And so, she took a deep breath and buried every detail of the dream in her memory, the people she was with, and the situation.
She saw that the woman on the throne looked at them coldly. She stood up and pointed at them while announcing to the onlookers her speech with a ruthless throne,
"Now marks the day of our reign… and the people you see here in the square are the traitors and evil people in this Empire!"
There was nothing but silence in the square… it was as if the onlookers were also restrained from talking in fear that they would join the captives at the center of the square.
As if she was unaffected by the lack of response, the woman smiled condescendingly and continued her speech, "And now, all you bear witnesses, that I, the Empress to the Seirende Empire will execute all the traitors and evil in this land!"
Lucia could not help but shudder in fear… if this was the near future that would surely mean one thing!
Their family will be wiped out by the woman in front of them!
"No… Why is this happening… Brother…" Lucia could not help but mumble as her body was trembling in fear.
She looked at Jeremy who was also trying to hold back his despair as his 'wife' and 'sons' were already wailing in fear.
"Lucia…" He looked at her with a defeated expression, his eyes no longer contained anything but hopelessness and anticipation of his demise. "... perhaps… death is the mercy of us…" He mumbled as he looked at the two people who were now reigning the Empire.
Lucia realized the meaning behind her brother's words, perhaps, there was no more future to look forward to with the people who were reigning the empire from this point forward. But is this kind of thinking just easy for her to accept?
What kind of hardships did her brother endure for his spirit to be killed like this?
Her thoughts were interrupted by the voice that could now effectively make Lucia tremble in fear,
"First up… this woman… lowly bard… a commoner… a whore!" There was anger and disgust in the woman's voice as she let the knights drag a pitiful delicate-looking woman.
The woman was covered with filth as if she had been confined in the sewers rather than the jail, but her beauty could still be detected with her graceful silver hair and captivating moss green eyes.
'Such a beautiful woman, what did she do to earn the wrath of the sinister woman, so much that she put her on top of the execution list?'
The dream did not show her how the woman was killed, but it was as if time had been brought forward.
Suddenly, she found herself standing on the execution platform, getting dragged by the hooded men into the bloodied guillotine!
