Chapter 1: part 1

"Lady Aurora, do you still not wish to eat?" A soft knock on my door brushed me out of my daze.

I took a look at the book in front of me, at the sketch that I had started two days ago. Still unfinished.

A sketch that, no matter how many times I draw it, I couldn't complete it.

"Lady Aurora?" Our butler called once again.

"Bring some snacks upstairs, please. And some wine. Berry wine. Have Amanda bring it to me. Tell her to just come in with the food. there's no need to knock. The sound irritates me." I called back.

Three days ago. I opened my eyes here three days back.

When I awoke, my whole body was filled with a dull ache. A dull ache, as if I haven't moved in days. As if...

As if I just woke from centuries of deep slumber. That's the only explanation for what I was feeling.

My body is still sore, but I can move. Most of my memories had also come back, along with how I ended up here in my bed when I was running away from Nethyria and Emperor Rowan before my consciousness was ripped away.

It took me one day to make sense of everything that was happening.

Or perhaps the whole three days that I had locked myself in my room, maybe.

When I looked outside of the once-familiar grand balcony in my room, all I saw was peace.

Peace, as if nothing happened in here, nothing happened in the Nethyrian Empire at all.

Singing birds. Warm sunlight. Happy servants. Beautiful garden, with almost every magical, rare, and beautiful flower in existence.

And... my parents. My mother. My father.

Taking occasional strolls in the garden, my father's loving gaze, as my mother enjoyed the scent and feel of her treasured flowers.

The servants accompanied them in case they might need anything at all. Everything looked so... normal.

It took exactly one day for me to figure out that I was now 600 years back in the past.

And that fact alone gave me a headache.

I took one look back at my unfinished sketch again. The hooded person...

I began recounting my memories back to that night when I was running from the Nethyrian soldiers.

The strong set of hands that had held me and lifted me off to the wind.

I did not remember much of anything from that night. It felt like it had only been three days, and yet it felt like it had been an eternity.

But there was this one memory that was etched deep into my veins.

That I was running. Why I was running. I remember what had happened to Nethyria and the entirety of Izalore.

I remember who rebelled, who infiltrated, who aided, and who switched sides and laughed at the top while watching everyone else be slaughtered and massacred.

I remember watching the Nethyrian common folk suffer in the hands of ruthless soldiers and extreme inflation. I remember watching humans be brought into the Lands of the Fae and the Elves, just to be reduced to slavery and breeding vessels.

I remember being imprisoned, breaking out, and having to flee from Nethyria myself before infiltrating into it again and again and again. I remember when they had finally found me right after I stole something precious from them and how they dispatched an entire army to chase after me.

I remember who was responsible, who was scheming, who was innocent and put to death. I remember all the darkness, and I remember suffering.

I remember that someone... someone had saved me, and I remember exactly what he had done to me.

He had saved me, and then he had killed me. And then I opened my eyes again and I was... here.

....