Chapter 60- Setting the stage

System, show me the list of people who's fate needs resetting.

At his command, the list of names highlighted in red appeared once again.

Lucious clicked on the very first name and an entire description about this woman appeared in his mind. It detailed her background, every significant decision she ever made, family members, friends and other people she cared about, just about everything Lucious needed to know about her.

After spending a couple minutes of reading the information provided, Lucious grinned and cracked his knuckles.

Sana Willis, a charismatic woman with a strong business acumen. She's been wasting her talents by serving as a waitress, but tonight that's about to change.

[Host has received 1 fate token]

[1 fate token has been used]

Guess Tanya is funding the process. Lucious mused as his consciousness slowly faded.

When he awoke he found himself in a familiar white space. In the blink of an eye, thousands of strings appeared. They quickly multiplied until millions of them had appeared, filling his entire vision.

Using the information that had slowly been assimilating since he changed Liara's fate, Lucious grabbed the closest string and got to work on changing her fate.

Unlike with Liara, Lucious had no intentions on altering her talents or affinities. Instead, he ensured that she would encounter him exactly three months from now.

Though the change was small, Lucious had already thought of how best to utilise her talents. If all went well, he would soon have a treasure trove of rare treasures that would otherwise take him months to obtain on his own.

These treasures could accelerate the growths of Lucious and Liara, along with anyone he deemed fit to help get stronger.

Before he could put his plan into motion however, he needed time to get stronger and prepare the initial stages of the plan before meeting Sana Willis.

This was seemingly enough to satisfy the system as her name changed from red to the usual black.

This is only a short term plan, her name will undoubtedly turn red again the moment she meets me. Lucious thought as his consciousness reappeared in his room at the tavern. Just as before, barely a minute had passed despite spending at least ten minutes in there.

I feel like the time dilation is slowly getting longer. A smirk slowly appeared on his face.

When he altered Liara's fate, he only spent a single minute in there, and yet fifty seconds had passed outside the space.

After meeting Tanya, spending around ten minutes in there was the equivalence of thirty seconds outside.

Twenty minutes in that space will mean a single minute passes out here. At this rate, it'll be more beneficial to train in there for extended periods instead.

The more he thought about it, the stranger it became. He had no idea as to why he could suddenly spend longer amounts of time in there compared to before.

As if sensing Lucious's thoughts, the system suddenly chimed in to explain it.

[When Host altered Liara's fate, was comparatively weaker.

Now that Host has formed a mana and aura core, and reached the peak of the first stage as an aura master and mage, Host's soul is slightly stronger and more resilient.]

[Additionally, Tanya used her abilities to fortify Host's soul to the chaotic elements.]

Chaotic elements? Lucious asked in confusion. This was the first time he had heard anything about the white space and he found it surprisingly interesting to learn more about these abilities.

[Monster cores contain a vast amount if chaotic energy which makes it deadly to anyone other than a monster attempting to absorb it.

Much like a monster core, the void or 'white space' as Host calls it, is similar as it contains a vast amount of chaotic elements. Each fate token provides a temporary boost to protect Host from these elements, but Tanya provided a permanent boost.]

By using the permanent boost from Tanya, along with the temporary boost from the fate token, Lucious could now stay in the void for up to fifteen minutes before needing to be pulled out.

Though as he grows stronger, the duration will increase with him until. Once he gains a soul strengthening technique from the system, he believes he could most definitely extend the duration much further.

As Lucious was making these interesting discoveries and gaining answers to questions he's had for a small while, Liara had been hard at work studying various books to further expand her magical knowledge.

Through her relemtless studying and training over these last few days, her magic abilities had already surpassed Lucious's own though he had yet to realise it himself.

To Lucious's knowledge, Liara still only possessed three spells and one passive ability. He had no idea that she had managed to create her own unique spells, nor that she developed them enough to rival any novice spell.

In his eye, Liara was just working hard to increase the damage and effectiveness of her beginner spells.

Of course, though her magic already surpassed his own, she was still developing her battle senses. Learning to detect enemy movement, learning to spot ambushes, and learning to recognise the difference between a feint and a real attack.

If she fought an opponent at the same measure of strength, Liara would undoubtedly lose due to her inexperience with combat.

These senses have all slowly been improving over the past few days during their questing, as Lucious had been training her as best he could.

But her experience was still a far cry from most people.

**********

As the duo had been slowly developing their own capabilities, Sienna and Bianca were currently engaged in a rather heated discussion of their own.

"You want me to do what!" Bianca's irritated voice practically echoed as she yelled in frustration. For a moment, she wondered if she had heard wrong.

However, the look on Sienna's face was enough to tell her that she was serious.

"What's the big deal? It'll just be for a few days." Sienna casually shrugged off her little sister's concerns as she kicked her feet up on the table to relax.

Bianca blinked in surprise then angrily stomped her feet at Sienna. She was used to getting her way and for the first time, Sienna seemed indifferent to her pleas.

Her face slowly became bright red in anger as she kicked the table over and grabbing Sienna by the shoulders.

Had this been anyone else, Sienna might have retaliated with equal aggression, and for a moment, she almost did. For a brief moment, her hand balled up into a fist before relaxing it.

It wasn't their familial bond that held her back, quite the opposite in fact. By refusing to react, Bianca became even more furious and unleashed her aura.

Of course, this was a small display of power in comparison to Sienna's aura who simply shrugged her off. As she ignored Bianca, a small victorious smirk crossed her lips.

Just like most siblings, Sienna found it fun to mess with her sister, and if she could make her mad in the process, then that was just a bonus.

In a household that revolves around fighting, being ignored was worse than any retaliatory punch.

"Why should I have to give up my free time for some first stage weakling? I've better things to do with my time." Bianca roared in anger as she shook Sienna by the shoulders.

"How many times must I tell ya not to look down on others." Sienna replied with a passive expression, as if Bianca wasn't shaking violently shaking her.

Hearing this, Bianca's brows twitched in annoyance as she glared at Sienna. "You're not seriously telling me that I need to be cautious against a first stager."

Her voice dropped into a sneer as she glared at her elder sister. While she would never look down on a second stage aura master or mage during a fight, a first stage aura master and mage was so weak that they could never harm her.

At least that was the way her narrow minded view on the world was currently operating.

"Tell ya what, you fight Lucious and win, then ya get ya way. Loose, and ya do as I tell ya like a good kitten." A sly smirk found its way on her face as she made a deal with her little sister.

After their earlier training session, she knew that Lucious was more than strong enough to defeat Bianca. If she lost to a first stage aura master, then maybe she would loose her superiority complex, or at least have it dampened slightly.

Though he never agreed to such a thing, Sienna was more than happy to volunteer him into such a position so long as it was convenient.

He is my disciple after all, if I need to use him for a demonstration then he can't refuse. A smirk crossed her lips as Bianca readily agreed to these terms.

She had no idea just how one sided the fight was going to be.