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She hadn't been an official reaper for very long when she felt the shift in the realms, the sensation of tearing causing her to bolt upright out of a dead sleep, wide-eyed and startled. Glancing around, she surveyed her bedroom, trying to place the odd feeling.
Maybe something was actually wrong, and it wasn't just her imagination. It could have been she just had a nightmare that she couldn't recall too, but that didn't sound likely enough to be true. It was weird, the displacement in her soul.
Shuddering, she kicked her feet over the edge of her mattress, getting up. No point in hiding in the dark when she craved answers. Maybe Grim would know what was going on with her. Last she checked, becoming an official reaper didn't come with any adverse side-effects.
Leaving her bedroom, she stepped out into the hall, a little surprised by the differently ranked reapers rushing around in different states of dress. Confused, she watched them mill around like ants, wondering if they had felt the shift too.
Humming softly to herself, she side-stepped them all as best as she could, heading straight for the main atrium. She had to speak with Grim to know exactly what was going on. Besides, she was the only one who could talk to them whenever she felt like it, since she was their charge and all.
Unflinching, she walked through the halls without missing a beat, tuning out the worried whispers around her and the high levels of stress. Grim would tell her everything she needed to know, and that alone soothed any if not all of her anxieties.
Opening the atrium doors, she expected to find Grim sitting at the base of the Tree of Demise. Instead, she stared in shock as the tree was just… gone. It had always been withered and old, but it was never supposed to simply disappear .
"Hello, Thirteen," Grim said, appearing out of the shadows, walking towards her slowly. She immediately rushed over to help them, placing their arm over her shoulders. She had never seen them so weak before.
"What happened to the realms?"
Grim sighed, suddenly sounding millennia old. "The balance between the Realms has been lost," they said softly. "The Virtues have all become Sins."
Thirteen could only gape at where the Tree of Demise had once been, wondering what the hell had happened to the Virtues.