Creation began on 07-26-23

Creation ended on 08-01-23

Attack on Titan

Unleash your Inner Tormentor

A/N: Sometimes, you have to be a demon when trying to be an angel will not suffice, knowing that doing so will affect you.

All he did was try to talk the young man out of his intentions to destroy the world, to suggest that he try to rewrite existence with the power he possessed, just as he had managed to convince others to do many, many times in the past and future of other layers, other levels of existence…and failed once more when he chose of his own volition to adhere to his dark destiny and destroy the known world with over eighty percent of the population…just to protect his island. And it infuriated him to no end that this man, this…arrogant fool…rather than fight against fate…chose to accept it without a fight, something he always stressed others to do, as though they had no choice in the matter. In fact, it did more than infuriate him this time. He felt like his traditional methods of dealing in retribution to the deserving and giving redemption to those who were wanting to prove to him and themselves that they could do better, be better, than they could've before…were not going to work with this man.

Smack! Brother Correction, in his fury, punched Eren Yeager in his face and sent him flying to the ground beside his equally despicable half-brother, Zeke Yeager, surprising the elder sibling.

"You're both lost causes," he called them out for their actions and failures. "You both claim to want to save your people and the world, yet neither of you demonstrate any desire to do right by anyone you dare to call your friends or allies. Neither of you deserve to breathe beyond right now…and Ymir Fritz doesn't to be ordered around or wait for a poisonous desire from the likes of a person that has so much self-hatred towards his people that he's willing to sterilize them and call it salvation…or a jerk that willingly sent his mother to Hell because he wants to be free from a life behind some stupid walls!"

As Eren slowly got back up, he saw Brother Correction glowing red with rage.

"You both want to see the end to your people's suffering that much? Fine! I'll end your people's suffering! I'll end all your suffering to the point where none of you will ever live to see the next day! Or your homes! Or your loved ones! You won't live to see any of them again…because you won't be around when the end comes!"

He turned around and approached Ymir Fritz, grabbing her by her neck and entering the tree of light, intent of carrying out his decision. Seconds later, the tree vanished, leaving the brothers within the realm that Ymir resided in upon her death.

"I think you should've just taken his suggestion to heart," Zeke tells Eren, worried about this.

"There's no stopping what is meant to happen," Eren replies.

Hear me, people of the world, they heard Brother Correction's voice in their heads. My name is not of your concern, but I want you to know that your fates have been decided by two Eldian men whose desires for salvation and freedom are as poisonous as the words they utter from their filthy mouths. I tried to be reasonable towards the younger brother, to persuade him to undo the suffering of the past, because he had the power to do so, but he decided to be a slave to his fate and condemn every one of you to his version of freedom that is born of bloodshed and pain. I would say that it was also your doing that caused this, because most of you use others as scapegoats for your failures and lost causes, and while that much is true in one sense, it only sticks when the previous generations damn the younger ones to repeat the same mistakes. But in truth, this has happened, time and again, with different outcomes. And I must confess that this is only happening because I failed to prevent your end. I failed to save you because of some people in some lifetimes just don't want to be helped. They don't want to be saved. If I can't save the younger brother from becoming a soulless monster that he chose to become, driven by hatred…then I can't save any of you this time around…so I must offer you this one mercy that will be granted. I won't end you in the here and now. I will end you before you get to live. How many of you were alive over a century ago? Back then, the world was recovering from the collapse of the so-called Eldian empire, when Karl Fritz decided to condemn his people to a slow-motion genocide and built the Walls of Paradis Island. I shall go to that time…and end all life so that none of you will be cursed with this poisonous hatred. You won't feel pain…because you won't be around. I am sorry for failing you. I hope that you can find it in your hearts to forgive my transgression.

-x-

Across the Walls of Paradis, across the oceans, everyone everywhere heard this voice and couldn't believe what was going to happen.

"Mom?" A little boy asks his mother in a small town. "Are we going to die?"

"It was an Eldian man that caused this?!" A woman in a large city yells. "It has to be the ones on that island!"

"…The voice claims that he tried to get the guy to change, but it was the guy that refused to change…"

"…He decides we can't be saved because some jerk doesn't want to be saved?!"

"Eren," utters Historia as she fears the outcome, "what did you do?"

-x-

As the head of the Tybur family turned to walk away from Karl Fritz, Brother Correction appeared and released Ymir Fritz from his grip.

"Karl Fritz!" He yelled at him, getting his attention as he approached him. "You have failed this world, and now you're going to bear witness to its end!"

Before Karl could react in any way, he was grabbed on his forehead by this stranger, almost dropping his child.

"You keep a concerned hold on your child so that you never drop 'em," Brother Correction says, causing Karl to stay still. "You cease thinking about anything."

Karl's mind became an empty void of thoughtlessness as Brother Correction grabbed his forehead. The next thing that came was the darkest of desire.

"You will release the Wall Titans and destroy the world," Brother Correction instructs him, "leaving nobody left to live. Trample the lands and the bodies of every man, woman and animal that can't get away. Scorch the terrain until there is only death and destruction."

"I will destroy the world," Karl replied, and Ymir watched with the only emotion she could express as the Wall Maria structure began to crack: Regret.

Regret because it was her fault; she had waited until it was inevitable to act out, and waited for someone who desired only freedom, even if it was at the cost of so much pain and suffering. Maybe if she had stood up against the king, maybe if she had just run away when she obtained such power…or shown any degree of rebelliousness when she was alive, none of this would be happening. But it was happening…and she had no say in the matter because of the man who had been enraged by one of her many, many descendants and subjects, time and again, because of his grotesque actions and willingness to commit genocide against the world for freedom.

As the Titans were revealed, they began their march towards the world.

Brother Correction erected a large dome over himself, Karl and Ymir, safeguarding them from the wrath of the Titans.

"Sleep," he told them, and they fell slowly to the ground, landing on soft, cloud-like structures that prevented them from being harmed; he was going to dispose of them, but not right away. Spare no one from this merciful retribution. Set them free from the fear of the future and the pain of the past.

-x-

"…What did you do, Eren?!" Jean demanded as he grabbed the traitor by his coat in front of everyone the moment they saw him alive and whole. "WHAT DID YOU DO?!"

"He set off a man that appeared where we were," went Zeke, who was also alive and in one piece, "and now he's going to destroy the world instead of Eren."

"What?!" Connie gasped. "What did he do?!"

"The guy offered him a second chance to atone for his mistakes, to undo what he did over the years, said that since he possessed the Founder, he had the power to rewrite history and save everyone by making what has happened come undone…but Eren refused him. He couldn't do something that he saw no point in doing, even when it sounded like the right thing to do…and the man got angry with his refusal and decided that none of us should continue living."

"You bastard!" Jean yelled at Eren and threw him to the ground. "You killed us all! You had a chance to actually do something right, and you piss it away for what? For what?!"

All around Shiganshina, everyone, Eldian and Marleyan, were unsure what to do. Some wanted to continue fighting, but others wanted to walk away while they still could; if they were going to be killed before they even got a chance to draw their first breath, what was the point of even doing what they did to begin with?

"I'm done with this," went Connie, turning to leave. "I'm done with all of this."

"Where are you going?" Armin asks him.

"To where my mother is, where else? If I'm going to die today, no matter what I do, I want to be with the last of my family when that happens. Goodbye, all of you."

He walked away from them, casting aside his ODM gear; he was done with the fighting, the secrecy, losing people and everything. There was no longer anything to gain…and he was going to lose what he had left, regardless of whether or not he stayed. If he was with his mother, at least he could go out with knowing that he was with her when his end came.

Armin looked at Eren…and felt like he lost his friend all over again because of a wrongful choice…and turned to walk away.

"Since I'm going to die soon," he expresses, "I may as well spend my few remaining moments with Annie."

Mikasa could only look down at Eren with eyes full of hurt and sorrow; if this stranger had offered a second chance to atone and set right to some wrongs, she wouldn't have hesitated for a second, but to know that Eren had outright rejected the very idea of using the power he had to do so, it just made her wonder what he was even after that undoing the losses they had experienced seem worth any of it. What was so important to him that he was willing to commit genocide for? But she knew now that knowing wouldn't change anything. If they were all going to die soon, she would rather be somewhere else than around him or his brother…and turned away from him.

"Mikasa," she heard his voice say to her.

"Whatever you have to say," she responds, "I don't want to hear it. I don't want to hear anything more from you."

"But…"

She had already walked away from him. This was many times worse than hearing him say that he hated her. And anything he could've told her right after wouldn't have changed how she felt right now, knowing that he enraged a man that offered him a chance to right his wrongs…but chose not to.

-x-

As the tormentor, he watched with grief in his eyes as the Titans marched across the land, shattering many buildings as people tried to flee from them. Their screams echoing through his ears and conscious as he saw people shoving each other in order to keep a step ahead of the advancing hordes of Titans. As much as he hated it, this was how it had to be. Slowly but surely, as the people died from being trampled to death, buried alive rubble, scorched and scalded by the intense heat they gave off, Brother Correction saw the people of the future being erased from existence, returning their souls back to the paradise they were cast out of in order to live among others of mortality. He viewed this as one of the many fates that were worse than death, but due to the factors of how this fate was being dealt out, it was a lesser fate; they didn't experience any pain because there was no pain for any of them to experience.

The losses they suffered, the hardships they went through, the sacrifices they made, none of those mattered because they never occurred. There were no friends or enemies to be made, no scars or traumas, no regrets or mistakes, nothing. But he didn't want any of them to forget the ones that mattered most to each of them, allowing them to see their loved ones just before they faded from existence. He watched as Reiner and Gabi, among the first to go quietly into the silence of the uncreated night, saw their family, followed Dot Pyxis and several members of the Garrison seeing their loved ones before disappearing.

May you live again one day in a better future, he hoped as his eyes were fixed on Historia, who stood up in front of the apparition of Ymir, who smiled and held out her hands to the young woman, who accepted her embrace without hesitation as she faded away, causing him to shed tears over the brief reunion. No more suffering. No more hatred.

-x-

Connie reached Ragako in time to be with his mother, who, against all rationale, was herself once more, sitting where her Titan body had once been.

"Connie?" He heard her say as she saw him. "Where is everyone?"

He quickly ran over to her and hugged her as tightly as he dared to.

"We're going to see them soon," he told her, just wanting to spend his final seconds with her as he started to feel less than whole. "We'll all be together again soon."

Moments later, Ragako had become a nonexistent place, people and all.

-x-

He would carry this shame like he carried his other failures for the rest of his life without end, living with his own torment that would be as eternal as his duty to deal in redemption and retribution. And he saw a mother trying desperately to protect her newborn as the Titans demolished her home.

"I'm sorry," he utters, watching as the intense heat silenced them for good. "I'm sorry."

Brother Correction saw in the undone future Jean vanishing after he saw his family and went with a smile, followed by Sasha's parents embracing the ghost of their daughter seconds before they faded from existence, accepting that they would see each other again someday. He watched as Armin found Annie, free from her crystal prison, standing in front of him; he made sure that she knew what their fate was and would permit her to see her father before they both died.

"It's really the end of the world," he hears her say to Armin, "isn't it?"

"Yeah," Armin answers her, "it is."

"Why couldn't Eren just do the right thing?"

"Because he thinks his way is the only way people should follow. It was only a matter of time before someone else came and took his offenses personal. Maybe more than personal. The person that said he would kill us wouldn't do something like this unless he had no other option…or felt disrespected by someone enough to take drastic measures."

"So, Eren disrespected him, and we're all paying for his mistakes."

"Yeah."

"Annie?" They both heard a man's voice as one appeared, using a cane to support himself. "Is it really you?"

"Father."

Brother Correction looked away as the three slowly began to disappear from existence, feeling more regret as their ancestors had been killed, which led to their own demise due to never being.

"I guess I didn't realize that you had it in you to go full-on tormentor," he heard his sister's voice behind himself. "You have more darkness in your soul than I realized when you get pushed too far and you turn several shades of wicked."

"Those that become a tormentor to some can still be disgusted by their actions," he responded, looking on as the Titans had laid waste to another continent within a matter of hours. "I am disgusted by this decision, but what other choice was there when those with the power to unmake their mistakes are just too set in their ways or beliefs to even try and change the lives of many?"

He didn't expect a response from her, as she was not a goody-goody like he tried to be most of the time.

"This girl here is worse than some people with independent thinking," he heard Sister Deception say, and he turned to see her looking at Ymir Fritz, waving her hands in front of the girl's face, not getting any reaction from her. "She looks dead, inside and outside."

"If you were a slave starved for love and never received any, especially from a man incapable of loving anyone except power and being in control, you'd be dead inside and outside yourself. We'd both be if we desired the affection of someone that had none to give."

"Oh, please, do I look like I'm in need of anyone's love?"

"No, you're just a timeless girl desperate for attention and seeking it from those that would rather be around someone else than around anyone who derives pleasure from people's suffering in an unending spiral of self-destructive hedonism."

Sister Deception frowns at him and, despite her looking like a little girl, performs a vulgar hand gesture to show her disgust towards him. But he was unamused by her response to his truthful opinion of her.

"You should go now before I do lose my temper on you and lay hands upon you," he tells her.

Sister Deception knew that he wouldn't dare touch her…but she also knew that she couldn't risk it, lest she incur their father's wrath.

"You killed an entire planet…and yet you grieve for the dead and dying," she says as she fades away. "I'm glad we're nothing alike."

Returning his gaze to the front of the world being destroyed by the Titans, Brother Correction sighs softly as he sees Mikasa, who had discarded the scarf Eren gave her years ago, returning to the one place she hadn't been back in a long time: Her family home. He didn't know what led her to return to this place where her parents were murdered, effectively destroying her childhood, but he could only guess that she wanted to be there when she died. While Eren claimed to hate her, he pitied how the man's efforts to push away everyone had the worst effect when he lost control of the situation he caused. And while Mikasa would be among the many that would see her loved ones before fading away into nonexistence, Eren, Zeke and those that hated others as much as they hated themselves would go into the uncreated night alone. He pitied those who would be alone when they came undone.

"Mikasa," he heard Mrs. Ackerman say to her daughter as she appeared alongside her husband. "Welcome home."

"Yes," Mikasa responds as she feels the lost feeling of relief in the presence of her parents well up in her heart for the first time in a long time. "I'm home."

Then, without any fear or grief of what was happening around her, Mikasa joined her family in the blissful oblivion as their existence came undone. And Brother Correction she'd tears for them, hoping they would one day live again.

-x-

It was insanity! All around him, Eren saw people disappearing from sight, either holding onto their loved ones or wallowing in despair.

You'll be among the last to go, Eren, he heard his voice say to him as he saw Wall Maria disappearing. To be the last one to go is a despair reserved for the vainest and depraved of souls going into that uncreated night. You who would those you chose to push away, just to die by one of their hands, only to face a greater retribution later on, for I will not let you experience the sensation of bliss. Your version of Heaven is everyone's interpretation of Hell, and Hell for you is the Heaven most only dread entering.

"Who are you?!" Eren demanded.

I am…the hope of those who have fallen from grace. I am love and hate amongst the hearts and souls of those who choose to believe in possibilities far beyond their negative qualities. I am grief, joy, despair, desire, fear, lust, truth and pain. You can think and say that I am the one who shed more blood than you intended to do before I took your power and left you a hollow shell of your former self, but we know that it was you who chose to spit in my face when I offered you a chance to undo the suffering that you could've prevented. But in the end, you choose to believe that you were right to do what you wanted to do, regardless of what others believed. That's all that matters to you, anyway…so nothing else will matter now. Take whatever joy you have left in the time you have left. Nobody's going to be missed by you and you don't really seem to show any genuine emotion for those who died because of your actions, anyway.

"That's not true!"

Oh, is it? Then why did you act the way you did when she was killed? You treated her death like it was something to laugh at. In fact, Eren, since you drove me to this series of repercussions, you make me want to laugh at you…but only because I choose to view one like you as nothing more or less than a pathetic wimp that wasn't careful with what he wished for and ended up getting less than what he got in the end. A lot less.

"You think this is a joke?!"

Do you hear me laughing?

Eren then saw, for just an instant, Floch screaming as he disappeared from existence, no doubt the result of his ancestors no longer being around in the past long enough for his existence to even become an option.

I don't laugh at the suffering of others unless they truly deserve it, and do I believe that you all deserve this suffering? I do not.

"But it had to be done! I had to protect my home!"

And now your home, along with everyone else's home, is going bye-bye because you chose to be an ass of a man deciding to lay down with his darkest of fates. So, I guess congratulations are in order for you, Eren Yeager. You fought…and you lost. You went up against someone you had no idea was stronger than you could ever hope to be…and you lost everything you claim to hold most dear to you. You home, your friends, your life. A false king stripped of his throne of deceit, left to wait for the inevitable as everyone around him is reduced to memories forgotten by all.

"Please," Eren did the one thing he didn't expect himself to do now, which was to beg, "please, don't do this. You can stop right now."

Oh, I could…but as much as I want to stop, I won't. If I stop now, if I undo the retribution that I have set in motion because of you…then I'm afraid that you will never learn why you had to suffer like everyone else is suffering, and that will have been among my greatest of injustice towards all. And, just as you kept whining about your precious freedom and your need to take it from others, including those that never even met you, that have never so much as spat in your face, I am free to make my own decisions towards each and every last one of you. You refuse to be merciful to the undeserving, to those that wanted nothing to do with your plight…so why should I be merciful to you? Why should I show you mercy, Eren Yeager, when you made the choice to be without mercy? Can you tell me why? Do you even know?

But Eren had lost the battle of words before it even started and knew he couldn't defeat this man that may as well have been a god compared to him. But was this man actually a man…or was he more or less than such.

That's actually similar to what was asked about you after you were exposed as a Titan Shifter, he heard Brother Correction say to him, making no hint that he was able to read his mind. You called yourself human, which was true, but your violent behavior was what made you feel less than human. While it has been suggested, discussed and even proven that it is human nature to be attracted towards violence and to want to inflict violence upon others, there will always be levels of violence that can and do disgust those that are unwilling or unable to go through with such violence. Armin and Historia are among such that despise violence, but you and your cultist fanatics are not such individuals. But getting back to the point of this, I am as human as you used to be, only, simply because there is a similarity, just as blessed and cursed as those who either have a duty or are just made to serve a greater purpose in existence.

"Aaah!" Eren heard a woman affiliated with the Yeagerists scream as she vanished from existence in front of him.

"Please," he begged again, "stop this."

I just told you, Eren, Brother Correction responded, if I stop now, I'll have done an injustice towards all of you, so I can't stop. Even though I want to, really, I do…but I can't stop.

"Why?!" A man yells as he disappears.

My heart goes out to each of you.

"You're a monster."

Sometimes. But everyone has a dark side to them. It's just a matter of who, what, where, when, why…and how that dark side gets unleashed. Maybe all it takes is one mistake. Maybe an accident or a loss. Or even someone provoking you into doing something that you know is wrong, just to see what happens. Or worse, none of those factors. You don't even need to have experienced something awful to be a monster. You just have to do terrible things to be considered a monster. I'd sooner experience a personal tragedy that was just an accident and have it slowly eat away at my soul than to become a monster on purpose because I felt it was the only way to get something done. I'm a monster…but only when it becomes necessary.

-x-

With a heavy sigh, Brother Correction watched as the last of the human race was wiped away by the Titans, along with all other forms of life on the planet, reducing its inhabitants to just Karl Fritz and his child. Once he dropped his dome, their end would come swiftly as their biological functions began to grind to a standstill and their final thoughts slowed to a stop.

"Dizziness," he recalls a man informing another man of what oxygen deprivation was going to be like when it took its toll on them in another universe, in another lifetime. "Skin will tingle. Vision narrows. Then shock, convulsions, acidosis."

"Is it gonna hurt?" The other man wanted to know as he was preparing for the worst.

"Yeah."

Brother Correction had been grateful that one of the two men survived the ordeal, though.

"You two are all that's left now," he told the unconscious Karl. "I'm sorry that you had to go out like this. I will pray for your demise to be painless."

He raised his left hand up…and his dome dissipated, exposing parent and child to the oxygen-poor environment of the ruined world.

"Aah…aah!" Karl gasped as he struggled to breathe. "What…what…"

He looked at his child, who was also failing to breathe. He tried to utilize the power of the Founder, to make the need for oxygen irrelevant, but his brain was failing to work efficiently enough to make use of the power.

"Who…who…"

"I'm nobody," he tells the man. "Just another monster."

Within moments after he said that to Karl Fritz, he and his child had succumbed to hypoxia, becoming the last of the human race to die because of the Rumbling that occurred in the past instead of the present. This left only those left in the present to be dealt with by the most horrific of fates.

"I'm sorry," he apologized, not to Karl but to his child. "I am sorry."

-x-

Zeke was slowly erased from existence in front of Eren.

"Eren," he utters with his few remaining seconds, "this is Hell."

And now, Eren was all that remained in an erased in a world erased by the Rumbling caused in the past…and standing in front of him was the man that he provoked.

"You're the last one," Brother Correction reveals. "I really wish it didn't have to come to this, but you brought this upon yourself and everyone else."

Eren tried to approach him, only to be shoved backwards with surprising force.

"Oh, you want to fight me?" He was asked. "That's all you want to do, to fight. Then that will be your fate, and what better way to torment you than to make you fight until you wish you can stop? Enjoy your own war, Eren Yeager. This…is your Heaven."

Brother Correction tossed something in front of Eren…and he saw that they were strange gloves with no finger slits.

"Pick them up," he was ordered to do. "Your first fight begins in ten seconds."

Moving to the side, Brother Correction revealed something behind him. It looked like a man, but their entire body was rotting away, there were exposed sections of bone and muscle tissue, and their eyes were burning red. Upon closer inspection, Eren saw that the rotting man resembled his father, Grisha, except a little younger and with some expression of disgust on his face.

"The walking damned," Brother Correction tells Eren. "Condemned to wander throughout the rest of eternity without a shred of hope. Perfect opponents for someone like you. Begin."

The corpse-like version of Grisha then charged towards Eren, who quickly put on the gloves after noticing that he had on similar ones. He punched the corpse Grisha in his face…and knocked his head off, dropping the corpse to the ground.

"Excellent. Excellent. Excellent. That's one down…and you still have more to face."

Eren looked at him…and soon wished he hadn't. Behind Brother Correction were over a dozen or so corpse-like versions of people, all in varying stages of decomposition…and each one with a look of contempt on their faces and wearing gloves.

"What is this?!" He demanded to know.

"This is your paradise, Eren," Brother Correction told him. "All you wanted of people was to fight for a freedom that simply doesn't exist anywhere…and you were willing to kill to be free. Now, you get to fight as much as you want now, and your adversaries will be many, as many as there were on the planet before the Rumbling killed them. That's over four-billion people to face. One after another. And you get to face each and every one of them to your heart's content."

"You're insane."

"You're not the first to make that assumption, and you won't be the last one, either, but I'm not the one that wanted people to fight. That, fool, is on you and every other person of a similar mindset as you. For you, violence is and will always be the only language you choose to comprehend. Every word you utter is full of a cruel drive, every time you touch someone or something, you have a twisted sense to undo. Anyone, even those with the Attack Titan, driven by a fear of being caged in a world where freedom is dangled in front of you, and the only way to get it is fight and die for it. Well, now, you get to do just that, Eren. You get to fight…and die for your freedom. Fight and die, over and over again. I can't think of any better way to torture you now that everyone is dead. Lament, meaning everything there is to whine about because you want it…but are denied it. Babies crying for their caregivers, lovers moping for their partners, you…pining for what will not be yours until you can prove that you can be a better person, which may never happen. A tormentor to some…and a savior to others. In this case, like so many others, I am and will always be viewed as a tormentor to those that simply don't get it."

"If I hadn't done what I was going to do, then…"

Bash! Brother Correction simply punched Eren in his face, knocking him down.

"Oh, yeah?" He questions. "Either way, the price for freedom was high and unforgivable. But you were willing to pay for it, just not in the way you should've done so to begin with. Try and think about what you could've done differently as you spend the rest of your eternity doing what you wanted others to do. Fight for your freedom, your pathetic right to live. Goodbye, Eren Yeager. Until we meet again, which won't be for quite a long time now."

And then, Eren was left with only the walking dead in front of him. He was alone, in a world where there was nothing left to live for. All he had was his life, which was stripped bare, with only what he had left. This was his paradise, what he was given by Brother Correction in order to torment him for his decisions. He was in for a long war of his own making.

The corpses ran towards him, and he raised his fists up.

-x-

Failure. Shame. Disgrace. Condemnation. Loss. These were the words that followed Brother Correction as he sat in his wooden throne under a moody sky that reflected his emotions over the grim reality of his own decision regarding the matter.

"I am sorry," he utters. "I have failed you all. I wanted your future to have hope, but I tried to convince the wrong person to do right by you. A violent soul is a soul that believes not in hope or cares nothing for redemption. I will pray for your forgiveness upon me as I await the day where you live again…and I promise you will live again. May the day come when each of you can smile without the pain of loss in your hearts."

A downpour of rain fell upon him as he sat with his chin resting on his left hand. Even as his clothes were getting soaked, he didn't move an inch. A man that fails to change the hearts of others must grieve for the lives taken away to smite the ones that saw redemption as weakness and would do so until their souls were lost to the possibility of hope. Even as he felt the presence of his twisted sister nearby, once more bending the rules of being near each other just to see what he was doing, he didn't stir from his position.

Sister Deception, despite enjoying his suffering, didn't get as much from him as she had thought she would, even when he had done something far worse than she had several times. In fact, she knew why she didn't derive as much pleasure from his pain as she had desired to. It was because he, unlike herself and plenty of others in existence, actually felt the grief that came with having taken their lives. He didn't do so with a perverse sense of satisfaction or for the sake of being cruel and justifiable, but because he had to enforce his position as a tormentor to some. She found his personal suffering to be less than to her standards; with the fate Eren Yeager was dealt before being left alone to fight a never-ending army of dead people based off the people that died in the Rumbling her brother instigated and the people he knew, trusted or loathed, she would've enjoyed his pain, but with Brother Correction himself, it was mixed with bitter and brief pity…and she didn't need that.

Even when he does wrong to punish people, he lets himself feel the shame of his own decisions, she thought as she left him alone. Even God himself takes from people and wouldn't feel the slightest tinge of regret! But him, no, he chooses to regret because he has a bleeding heart for the innocent. Everyone that doesn't choose to be cruel and uncaring to those that want nothing to do with conflict are viewed as innocent to him. How pathetic!

But even if she thought of him as pathetic for feeling for his victims, his innocent victims, it was his choice to feel for them. It was this grief, this sympathy, that drew the line between being a tormentor…and being human.

Lament, he thought.

A/N: The first time where we see Brother Correction lose his cool in a manner where he takes control and dishes out the punishment. He did say he was a tormentor to some, but it's a job he hates doing because of the repercussions. And in the end, he's left with his feelings of guilt and regret for all of those lives he undid. Sure, I had Eren make one attempt to get him to stop, but it's not the same as seeking forgiveness; he didn't apologize and therefore had no other option but to witness everything and everyone disappearing in front of him as the Rumbling erased the past and present. You can't do what you do to someone that has the power to undo your world and not expect them to feel disrespected or like everyone around you must pay for your mistakes. But in the end, those that feel regret are the ones who suffer the most, not the ones whose paradise is their purgatory.