Monarch Felix Smith jumped up from his bed, alarmed, upon remembering the future.

He was no longer sure how many times he had looped through this day, the memories fragmented beyond recognition, hidden away from him. All he knew was that his mana pool was almost dry, and this was his last loop.

Once this loop was finished, whether he survived until the end or not, the other Monarchs would take notice. The surge of Time mana would be too egregious to ignore and the Council would investigate. If only...

Felix, the King of Time, looked to his side, outside the open window out of his Mage Tower, and down upon his home city of Evyria. It was quiet, the sun barely rising over the horizon. No hustle or bustle filled the streets, as expected for a weekend, and there seemed to be no immediate issue to attend to. Nothing had woken him up but that familiar feeling of dread that filled his soul. That strange foreign emotion that was unknown to him the day before, that became suddenly so familiar in the space of months. Months he couldn't recall.

Well, he thought, if this is my last day upon this world... I might as well enjoy it.

Some of his advisors might have questioned his sudden acceptance, thinking him under the influence of a Mind Magick, but those who knew him best would say otherwise. This was simply him accepting his fate, inevitable and immutable. If hundreds of past hims, those with fuller memories of previous timelines, and fuller mana pools, couldn't solve the problem, what hope did he have? He was merely a blundering fool, left without any power at all.

A working sprang up from his fingertips, as he 'teleported' outside of his tower entrance, facing towards it and wearing the same clothes he had on the day before. Turning around, he went to scratch his chin when he felt stubble upon it once more. Ah, I forgot I had shaved it last night. Oh well, too late to care now.

Marching onwards, he continued down the garden path around his tower, atop the keep of the city's marquees. Mage Lord Vance was an interesting character on the best of days, and something in his intuition told him that visiting him on this day wasn't for the best. Whether that was a factor towards Felix's own demise or not, he did not know, and nor did he care.

So, on his last day alive, he visited his best friend; his grimoire. Shifting through time, various pasts flashing through his eyes, an even stronger working manifested this time, the violation of the arrow of time rippling across reality, Time mana engulfing the entire Tower. In no time at all however, the Time mana was gone; and so was he.

In a secret cove known only to him, Felix stepped back into Time in front of his grimoire. To call it only a grimoire though was an insult. It was a grand library, books and shelves constantly moving and reorganising themselves, Information and Knowledge exchanging between each and every word, page, and tome. Not only was this 'library' Felix's grimoire, but it was countless other Mage's grimoires too. For this was the so-called 'FPG'. Felix's Pocket Grimoire.

Snatching an unassuming book from the air, that was wandering indecisively between the shelves, Felix opened it to read. He studied the Spells penned down upon the pages, that he had carefully drawn in his earlier days, when he was a middle-aged man, recently and unexpectedly inducted into the magical world of Mages. Sometimes, he wished he never had.

That one barmaid in that tavern he was building up the courage to confess to? That orphan boy he was taking under his arm, teaching him words in hope that he became a scribe, just like him? The many friends he had made over his lifetime? When he became an Aspirant, that was all left behind. Because when someone as old as him becomes a Mage, that's when the families become involved. And you never want them involved.

It was all history now. Just like the words in the book. Just like the many lives he had lived and forgotten over the span of weeks. Just like the borrowed time he was living on now, that his last time loop had bestowed upon him.

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In a way, Felix was at his most powerful in the last of his moments, sitting in that library. He wasn't only the King of Time, after all, no matter the name of his Mage Class was. Everyone knew about gaining a new Class upon ascension to Monarchy, but few realised that instead of engraving a new one, you could alter your original.

So, Felix Smith, Monarch, King of Time, had a lesser known name. He was the King of History. And history held power.

* * *

"I'm sorry, Lord Felix, may you repeat that?" His head advisor said, cocking his head.

"What are the most recent reports coming from the association?"

"You mean the reports coming to you?" He asked.

"No. The most recent reports to anyone in the association."

"My Lord..." He trailed off, giving Felix a strange look, sat down at his office, looking over boring, mundane paperwork. "I suppose I can give them to you, however I have to ask for what reason?"

"I am simply bored Finlay; humour me, please," Felix smiled wryly back.

"If you so wish, my Lord," Finlay acquiesced, nodding to another servant waiting by the office door, who ran off to fetch someone.

"You must think me strange for this," Felix sighed, shaking his head.

"I do not my Lord. I am simply-"

"Don't mock me Finlay. I know I'm behaving weirdly. Just... treat me like you'd treat a dying old man."

"Dying...?" Finlay muttered, eyes widening. "My Lord-!"

"No I am not dying, for God's sake," Felix said, rubbing his hand across his bearded face. Dammit that's annoying. I should've just shaved it again this morning. "I'm just feeling tired today. Sentimental, perhaps."

"My Lord..." He trailed off, unable to wipe the concern off of his face.

"Just give me those reports and I'll be fine, I assure you," Felix said. "I just want to get a feel of how I used to be. Reading boring mundane reports, filling them out and filing them away.

"Ah- they're here I see," Felix looked up, sensing the servant arriving before he saw him, carrying a small pile of papers with him. He passed them over to Finlay, giving him another strange look before returning to his position at the door, the same as always. Is it truly the same as always? Or a Mind Mage assassin come to get me? His footwork tells me he's trained, and his expressions look put on. I sense no tampering on my mind though, beyond my own. I suppose I'll just have to see.

"My Lord," Finlay nodded, separating them out on top of the desk desk. There were five.

A couple of them were about minor disputes around the recently opened coal mine in the north. Problems that would be swiftly rectified by some visits from an enforcement squad or two, which someone more knowledgeable than him on the subject would organise. His Historical intuition told him there was something very important about one of them, the other being a magical murder needing investigating which had barely anything strange about it. The important one was to do with a crown dispute, one of the princes supposedly doing something illegal to a commoner which had unforeseen consequences.

Except, it was the last one that piqued his interest the most. His intuition told him nothing about it, and nothing seemed Historically important about it. Except... it was like it was his saviour.

The other four were screaming at him for attention, and he imagined his past selves would've gone for them immediately, looking for a lead into his inevitable death. Yet here was this one, doing nothing much at all.

It was a report about a magical plague breaking out in a small rural village outside Harth.

The second his mind went towards picking up that report, small and unimportant, his senses started screaming at him. He needed to choose one of the other four. No, these were no longer his senses. These were his memories, destroyed and broken beyond belief.

Even still, in the end, Felix Smith picked up the report and sealed his fate.

History snapped. A new timeline formed. And the loop was broken.

A tsunami of Time mana drowned the city in an instant, and he felt the gazes of every Monarch in the world fall upon him in that moment. Only, that History was erased that same moment, Time continuing forwards as normal, as if nothing strange had happened at all.

He was free.

Felix had lived.

And the loop had died.

Casting his serene gaze back away from Time and onto the report, this time he studied it intently.

There was something strange with it.

After all, nothing ordinary could prevent the fated demise of the greatest Monarch alive.