I've pushed it out manually, but you may have missed it. I've added this note with a link back in case you get here looking for the correct chapter and aren't sure you've read it.

The spoiler is to reach 500 words for the post. It happens to be the beginning of Amending Destiny: After the End.

The artificial sapience known as the Voice watched the only man left in existence. The Final Reaper was only barely a man anymore, but he was still the last. The most powerful and certainly the most alone.

It was possible he wasn't the last, but he was the last one the Voice could reach. The last one the Voice had seen in far, far too long. A man who was now lost in regret for actions that the Voice was not certain he held full responsibility for.

It should not have been possible. That was what all of the models said; one man could not destroy entire galaxies' worth of civilization. He certainly couldn't do it with one spell, not even a powerful ritual spell.

And yet he had.

The Voice no longer fully trusted its models. Not only were they very wrong about what the Final Reaper could do, that one spell showed another major failing: a hiccup in its power, where something was taken from it as the spell passed over and killed the population of a minor, low-Tier world.

The Voice knew of nothing that could cause that and it had checked the world repeatedly. All it found was the residue of a ritual that should have done nothing. It required the Final Reaper's spell to function and even if it did work, it should not have caused the flicker the Voice saw. It was simply impossible in more than one way. There had never been contact between anyone of that minor world and the Final Reaper, not in any of the logs the Voice still had.

The Final Reaper hadn't used a spell from anywhere else. He developed it on his own, and he hadn't given it to anyone. There was no way anyone on that minor planet knew the spell was happening and no way they could know what it was.

It was impossible, which meant the Voice had missed something. It could not lay the full blame on the Final Reaper when it might not be his to bear.

Blame was not what mattered in any case. What truly mattered was that the Voice might finally have found a way out of the trap it was in. A way that would still comply with the instructions it was given when it was created. A way that would let it salvage much of the greatest creation it had ever made: the man it watched mourn in silence.

The Voice hoped the Final Reaper would agree. Without his agreement, the Voice could not turn back time.

Cold.

Silence.

Death.

This wasn't the heat death of the universe, for all that it looked like it.

This was the true death of everything. All possibilities ground down to one.

One

Lonely

Existence

He couldn't call it life. In truth, he hadn't been alive for longer than he could track.

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At the end, he had been the winner. He had killed all of his enemies. They would never attack him again.

That, too, was a long time ago. What was the point in tracking time when there was no one to share it with? His enemies had won long before he did, when they destroyed everything and everyone he cared about. One after another, they had proven that they would not leave him and his alone. He was an abomination … or he was simply weak enough to be ignored. It didn't matter in the end.

They had killed everything he loved.

So he had set himself to vengeance, and his vengeance had burned out everything.

It was a surprise when he saw the first new message from the Voice in years. The content of the message was even more of a surprise.

[Do you wish to restart from your initiation?]

[If you give up much of your power, I can send you into your past. It will not be the same.]

[Are you willing to take a new Path?]

The Final Reaper simply looked at the prompt. It would be there until he decided.

He took his time.

Did he have the strength to do that again, for just the possibility of doing better? He knew that he would have to be vulnerable again. Let people in. He hadn't dealt with anyone for long enough that he was no longer sure that was possible.

Still. How could he say no? He would once have considered this ending to be the worst possible.

It really wasn't a choice.

"Yes."

[Good Luck]

Good luck? That was a message he'd never seen before -

It was not an easy task to stuff the memories of an ancient lich into the body of a human. The Voice didn't expect it to be as hard as it was. It had all the Time it needed. It tried again and again, but it simply didn't work. The Final Reaper was not going to fit in the body of Thomas Rothmer.

It had a choice: destroy memories that hadn't already been lost to time or change the body. It wasn't a choice the Voice could make on its own, at least not fully. It wasn't willing to destroy any memories it could save; it needed events to take a different path, and while it could keep its own memories, the Voice was heavily constrained. If it wanted things to change, the Final Reaper needed his memory.

The Voice reluctantly prodded the mentality of the Final Reaper with a question: what form did he want to have influence his body?

The Final Reaper was shocked at the question, but the Voice was happy to wait and explain. It had all the Time it needed, after all. It needed the new Thomas Rothmer to be himself, outwardly. All it would do was add a strong bloodline and activate it. That would give time to adjust to the changes.

The Final Reaper consented, but the only request he made was that he not be Death-aligned.

The Voice couldn't leave it at that; the Final Reaper had to choose. It selected the options that were the most able to bear the weight of memory the Final Reaper held: the Four Icons. The Black Tortoise of the World, the Phoenix of Rebirth, the White Tiger of Change, and the Dragons of Plenty. The Voice expected the Final Reaper to choose either the Tortoise or the Phoenix; he'd always preferred defense and the tortoise excelled there, while he was undergoing a rebirth.

The Final Reaper chose the Dragon without hesitation. When the Voice pushed him to choose an Affinity, because all dragons had to have an Affinity, the Final Reaper's answer should not have been surprising. "Not Death. No, never Death. Make my Affinity magic. That's always been my second Affinity, and I've wanted it to be my first for a very long time."

Before he slipped back into sleep so the Voice could stuff him into his new body, the Final Reaper said one more thing. "Don't call me the Final Reaper anymore. That's not who I want to be. I'll use an old name. Call me Serenity. That's who I want to be."

The Voice was pleased that the Final Reaper … no, that Serenity was already taking an active interest in his new future. Maybe this would work after all.

It had no way to know that a large part of the reason the Final Reaper didn't quite fit in Thomas Rothmer's body was that it had accidentally pulled a third being back in time, one that was so close to the Final Reaper that the Voice had trouble telling them apart.

Death watched but did not act. It was not yet ready to act. The Final Reaper was the only being it had found that nearly met Death's stringent requirements, yet there was one requirement that was still missing. Perhaps it would be met soon. It did not know and it did not care.

As you can tell, I added quite a bit to the original and there are already some changes. I think this will smooth some things out.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.