Mercy withdrew her attention from the broader cosmere, turning her focus back to her system. The supernova was bearing down, and she had to be ready. She started to act, but something nagged for her attention. Frowning, she concentrated her presence on the populated planet.
Horror. How could this have happened? She had only been away for a short time...
While she had been gone, a disease had started. It spread like wildfire through the people with shocking lethality, lining the ground with corpses. Few had survived. The people, accustomed to her removing their suffering, were left entirely susceptible to disaster. In a short period of time, the entire planet was desolated.
Anibelmeth steeled herself. She could eliminate the disease. She could restore civilization. She could- She-
She had allowed this to happen. No, not allowed. She had caused it. It was only due to her negligence that the catastrophe was able to become so great. On the surface of the planet, Anibelmeth formed a body. She knelt, the snow crunching as she stared down at the lifeless face of a young boy who had been taken. A single tear dropped from her eye, crystalizing before it hit the ground.
No. She could not let this happen again. Never. She could not afford them her grief, as she was far too critical. She would do what needed to be done.
Anibelmeth grasped the strands of time, searching, but she already knew. Her plan could no longer work. She doubted it ever would have, but she had wanted it to so badly, to find a different way. A better way. But now... now Anibelmeth saw. As the blast of the supernova raced ever closer, she saw. She could not save them now. But she could do them one final act of service.
One last mercy.
She killed them. All of them. All the ones who had survived the disease, killed in a single painless instant. Far better this way than the suffering that they would experience as the supernova tore them apart.
The light from the supernova finally reached the system, blasting the outermost planet to bits. She grabbed the two seeds it brought with it and tore them away, ignoring the ensuing screams that rippled through the Spiritual Realm as the system's soul was sundered. This way, she would be free of her self-imposed cage, free of what had been stopping her from fully committing to her goal. She strode from the system, leaving behind all her previous efforts. In her wake, destruction followed as it was set ablaze, entire planets crumbling to bits.
She did not mourn. She did not look back.