For the past dozen or so sleep cycles, you've been having the same dream: a jade-handled sword flies at you and you catch it, dark figures gather outside the door of your hab box, a woman with crimson eyes offers you something that makes the world itself shudder.

Which are all things that are going to happen in the near future. It's something your mentor had always resented: the very literal nature of your dreams. To her, prophetic visions were supposed to be steeped in allegory and mysticism, all dragons devouring suns and phoenixes weeping blood, requiring days or weeks of meditation and introspective reflection to decipher.

Your off-hand remark that you're simply made different did not make her any happier. And she was secretly glad that you ultimately failed to make any meaningful progress down the path of Omen, despite her outward commiserations and sympathy.

That said, you did figure out that when those kinds of dreams came, they did have a deeper meaning. Because whenever they happened, they always marked a time of change and upheaval. A time to abandon your current path and find another.

(cont)