However, when Dmitri and Annan just started to plan for the next step…
Ivan Austere-Winter discovered the two brothers who were secretly making plans.
So Grand Duke Ivan had beaten up Dmitri.
Firstly, it was because Dmitri dared not ask his father’s opinion on such a significant matter as the eldest son. Secondly, he failed to set an example as an elder brother and led his younger brother Annan to mess around. Thus, he had to take the second beating in Annan’s place.
Dmitri did not care about his fertility, and he did not even think about having children.
Even though he did not care about this matter, the fact that he was infertile would make the Dukedom unstable. That was simply because he was the first heir.
At that time, Maria had decided to take the path of the Daughter of the Storm.
Thus, the Young Annan was the only one left to inherit the throne as the Grand Duke.
This decision incited Maria’s panic. Unlike her elder brother Dmitri, Maria did not particularly trust the Young Annan. On the contrary, she was worried and overly caring for him.
Their mother died in the second year after Annan was born. There were supposedly six brothers, the sixth of whom died before birth, and the remaining two died of [Winter Heart] power before they were three years old. Thus, they did not get their name.
Annan was the child before last.
Maria was the third child before last.
Dmitri took care of her since birth, and she would take care of Young Annan.
She was more like a mother than a sister.
Even though she knew that Annan was talented, she did not trust the child she raised with her hands and was intensely worried. Compared with Annan and her father Ivan, she believed Brother Dmitri could be a better Grand Duke.
However, Ivan’s lifespan had not been successfully extended because of the Rotten Man, and he might die at any time.
—At that time, brothers and sisters would depend on each other for their lives.
Compared with ordinary people who only wished to “live a good life”, the three still had the people of a country to be taken care of. Not long after the war, foreign enemies were around, and the nobles in the country seemed politically unstable. At the same time, they still had to take care of and protect the common people.
Dmitri’s brother, whom Maria trusted the most, lost his right of inheritance.
The future Austere-Winter Dukedom would fall into the hands of Young Annan.
How could she bear it?
The originally calm Maria planned to enjoy her life and wait to die. She would then inherit the Daughter of the Storm when she was 40. However, she made up her mind to become a formidable transcender as soon as possible.
This was also why she had participated in Master Michelangelo’s succession ritual.
She was the Edict Wizard from the Storm Tower, the future Daughter of the Storm.
However, the Daughter of the Storm was mortal and would die one day.
Maria was not afraid of death, but she was worried about Annan.
Could Annan really take care of himself without her?
She also felt that Michelangelo’s sudden summoning of eight young wizards must be a conspiracy. Most likely, he was doing some ritual. But at that time, she could not care about that much anymore.
Just like when Dmitri and Annan acted privately, she did the same to their father.
It might be revenge, or it seemed like a strange comparison. She did not tell Ivan and Dmitri about her going to Howling White Tower.
Maria had always been upright, saying and doing what was in her mind.
She was firm and unyielding, taking responsibility on her shoulders and moving forward in silence.
Compared with girls of the same age or the heirs of the emperor who grew up in a world surrounded by conspiracies, she was more like those Austerians of ordinary families who owned a family business.
It was also because of her integrity, Maria almost died in the taboo ritual of the Twin Towers [Overlapping Death and Life].
At that time, Maria did not understand how this ritual took effect. Only when they were fighting each other until only four of them left did they hear Michelangelo’s message, telling them that this was the first half of a ritual.
It was not until not long ago that they realized this was an ascendancy ritual.
Michelangelo, the host of the taboo ritual, had successfully sublimated and achieved true deity not long ago.
Michelangelo was pronounced as “the Man in the Mirror”.
So when Maria came back that year, Dmitri got another heavy beating.
This was the unbearable weight of the eldest son.
In any case, it was he who was beaten up.
But also, thanks to the beating, Dmitri remembered it clearly. According to Maria, only four people survived that ritual.
Except for Maria, the remaining three were all dangerous folks. Of course, the few who died were even more difficult.
The Man in the Mirror’s pope, Benjamin Foster;
The Black Wizard from Swamp’s Black Tower, David Gerald;
The Man in the Mirror’s student, Ghirlandaio Buonaro of the Prophet School.
And the name, Ghirlandaio David Buonaro.
It happened that the names of the two survivors were mixed in this ritual.
Although Dmitri did not know why “David” was added as the middle name, it was undoubtedly the person “Ghirlandaio” who Maria mentioned, judging from his appearance.
That harmless and docile Prophet Wizard maintained peace until the end. Maria did not know what he did or what tricks were on his sleeve. Presumably, he had already used the Prophet Magic to rewrite everything that might affect his future.
The purpose of the Prophet School had never been just to “see the future”.
What they practiced was the skill of “rewriting the future based on the past”.
Dmitri once met a Prophet Wizard from the Twin Towers.
When Dmitri asked him, “Prophet school can directly obtain the results of their study through spells, then what exactly do they need to learn”, the person replied by throwing a question back to Dmitri.
“If ‘yesterday’ has become ‘tomorrow’, it will become two days ago. So is ‘the day after tomorrow’ ‘today’ or ‘yesterday’?”
Dmitri was dumbfounded.
Although he did not figure it out in the end, he was convinced that the Prophet Wizards were a witty bunch.
The silent, low-key, and unobtrusive Prophet Wizard must have laid many tricks, and definitely the “Prophet” at the highest level.
The witty brains were constantly working. Every one of them was smart and scary, and everyone had a future vision. A Prophet Wizard, who could modify the future from the past, looked so ordinary that people would forget it if they did not pay attention.
If you saw this, would you believe it?
Anyway, Dmitri did not believe it.
His feeling at the time was, “The Prophet School is a wily bunch.”
The more low-key the person looked, the more likely he was calculating everyone he could.
Dmitri glanced at the gentle and cheerful middle-aged man in front of him.
As predicted, he saw a silver ring in the person’s hand.
Have I fallen into the plot of these nagging Prophets again?
The thought came to Dmitri’s mind.