There is an old story the Reapers tell each other, though none of them remember who told it first.
It says that long before the ramp, before the fire, before any of this had a name, there were Kings.
Not rulers. Nothing so small.
They were the ones the dark itself stepped aside for.
The story says they were never gone. Only quiet. Only waiting, the way a blade waits in a sheath.
And it says you'll know them when they come, not by the crown, but by the way everything else goes still.
The Reapers don't tell this story anymore.
$RAMP