*For the next two parts, if you wish to enhance your reading experience, listen to Ylang Ylang (Slowed + Reverb). Here is the link. https://youtu.be/rTNYaoyHHd4

If you wish to listen to it on spotify, its simply Ylang Ylang by FKJ, ((( O ))). Thank you for listening and enjoy this chapter of Destined :)

Veronica Ashburn POV:

Winter came about once more. However this time, something came along with the usually dreading feeling of the harsh cold that reminded me and Aldir of our struggling financial situation. I was soon to be due. 

Our first child would be soon born.

I can't even remember how long ago we ran away from both our families, but it all seemed so sudden. I can still vividly recount each detail of the night we spontaneously vanished from both our life's that were established in the capital. He had little to no money on that night and obviously I didn't have much either. I was from a commoners family and was also female. Any money that our family would have would go into cultivating my younger brother and his future, hoping to retire both my parents and find me a suitable partner that can look after me. 

Anyway, that wasn't the important matter at hand. The passion and affection sprouting from our love, rested inside me at this very moment. For eight months and twenty eight days. I counted each day since we found a second magical signature exerting from my body. The joy on our face's and the worrisome expression that was simultaneously filled with gratitude that appeared on his face, still brings me great appreciation till this moment. Yet I couldn't shake this feeling that I had been receiving ever since falling pregnant with Eli.   

Strange dreams would harass my late nights. Feverish dreams that I've never had. Picturing scenes I've never seen and living through a montage of somebody else's life and the people they were surrounded by. 

The countless nights I'd wake up in a rush, my robes clinging to my moist skin heavily drenched in sweat. Detailed apparitions of severed carcasses, bodies swamped in piles leaking the most vile and viscous crimson blood that could have filled entire seas. The further I progressed through the pregnancy the more painstakingly particular they got. Throughout all of this was a single man. First an infant, then a boy, then a teenager, a growing man, and finally a shell of a former person who clung to the direst cruelty spilt on the battlefield. 

His life was forgettable, filled with no care nor love. Filled with isolation and the craft of murder and destruction. Honed to be the strongest and to propel his families situation. 

His young scenes as a boy were all the same. Siting in his room solitarily, given books to learn from and shut in. Called out for food when the time came and expected to train and fight whenever it was asked of him. The blood tearing from his bruised body dripped around the ground and the walls he would walk through. Beaten furiously and treated like an already formed combatant expected to be able to defend himself. 

Each scene became more cruel and unbearable. No matter what I did, unfortunately, the dreams constantly flowed. It became routine to see them and not once did they fail to show. They just progressed with intervals of days, sometimes months, occasionally years and sometimes even only hours like the time I would spend sleeping. 

I though of consulting Aldir, but I didn't want him to worry about me or the baby. He was already working so diligently to provide for an extra mouth to feed and made sure to care for me, it felt all too wrong. 

The dreams had a consistent pattern of following everything in chronological order, or what it seemed like. The dialogue always seemed to cut short whenever the persons name would be mentioned. Most people's anyway. The protagonist that I watched from night to night, roaming round the battlefield like he was searching for his missing heart that seemed to have been stolen from him since he first dabbled in the light protruding from the sun. 

I was never worried for the protagonist of my dreams. He never looked like he would lose a fight, yet he would at the same time still continue his search for the thing he'd been missing all this time and attempted to fill the void through a meaningless title of the 'strongest in the world'. 

I...actually wanted him to die. And with each day we came closer to my due date, as he turned an adult and powered through the battlefield, his pace declined and his exhaustion developed at an alarming rate. Another growing emotion that sparked in me, was familiarity. A deeply tied love that I felt towards him that contested my thoughts of wanting to see him die. Somewhere in my heart, I had realised that I would rather him find his heart rather than perish in the way that he's dished out on this forever extending cemetery he left in his wake. It was cryptic, but it seemed to be spurring some emotions that were kept latently. 

"Who are you?" The countless times this question seeped from my mind constantly, smouldering me in relentless agony as each splatter coated the mana in the menacing gushes of blood. 

Finally the day before I gave birth arrived. Winter in the year, Draconic 3rd 667. The very last nightmare I received. 

"I have no more words to spare on you, Evert." The words rang from the dreams that usually pitched out in silence when a name was mentioned. A once prosperous small village discoloured into nothing but destruction, havoc wreaking from the burning Human Kingdom in the sky, the mountains reshaped by the destructive force of these two clashing the night before. The Elven forest that was uprooted and had its terrain changed forever. Now the two men, who were often seen together throughout these dreams, fighting side by side until in one of the dreams he vanished. The only ray of light and emotion that was dimly lit in the protagonists head had been extinguished after that dream. 

Facing him now, no feeling emerged from the nostalgia or comradery he shared with him. The two would clash, ending in a close victory for our protagonist, Milo Xander. The hero hailed throughout the lands, who sacrificed himself for the cause of eliminating the threat that challenged the world. Yes, sacrificed. An underhanded, last hope tactic used by Evert to bring down the hero. 

The hero that everyone looked up to, was pitiful. Nothing but a broken child who consoled himself in the only way he could. His mind felt content at the time of his death, yet his heart and mana unanimously agreed on their dissatisfaction. The yearning feeling of being taken care of and loved, burned stronger and brighter than any of the magical spells he casted throughout my dreams. 

That was it. The end of my dreams. 

On the day I gave birth, I had a vision. Not a dream, but a vision. The mana of our fallen hero gathered around me and a single figure painted in pure gold with a blinding white background following his shadow manifested. 

"Will you accept him? Give him the chance to experience everything he has ever wanted? Help him change? I beg of you on his and mine behalf. He is still needed and I'm sure he'd want to change his pitiful past outcome. So please, will you accept him?" A solemn voice that reverberated prestige and glory. A kind affectionate tone accompanied by sorrow littered throughout his words as he got on his knees and extended his hand. 

I instinctively grabbed it and smiled. "I'll show him all he wanted. The right way to die was not what he got. I'll help him survive and die the right way. But before that, show him the love and care he never got from his mother."

The figure dissipated, falling into ash and leaving its corners turning upwards gracefully into a smile of gratitude. 

Next thing I knew, the mana had all but been absorbed by my baby. I don't know if I killed my own son by giving his body up, but it felt right. No matter what, the journey I lived through and the regret that sprouted inside of me, domineered my decision. A child, even if not yours, can become ones own.  

That's why he's Elias Ashburn. Not Milo Xander. Milo was broken. Eli will be better and have a much better life. For the sake of my child, I will dedicate myself to watch over him.