The Absolute: Humanity's Second Chance

This made no change whatsoever. 'As expected, minor changes do nothing to alter fate.' He thought, moving hundreds of particles, and randomly placing them anywhere on the quintessential string.

And this finally caused it's form to twist heavily, as if a sleeping snake had been startled awake.

...!!!

The void he was within lightly quaked, as the quintessential string changed form, avoiding linking itself with the previous quintessential string.

Instead, the former skipped over the latter, and connecting to an even brighter quintessential string, that had a bright visage, and sturdier particle formation.

'Adonis' destined path... even if I desired to change it, it would be hard for me... Or not.' He thought, moving on as his theory was proved.

As for the young girl's fate? It was now better than before, but Damien never thought about how this would not only affect her, but most definitely a lot of people.

After all, for now, everything was still normal within this unique space. And he also had more to understand about Fate and Destiny before he could begin affecting it.

At the same time, he saw how his Kismetic Essence went down from 74 units, to 67 units with just that action alone. It had previously increased by two the past two hours, but decreased by seven in seconds.

'It seems I can not play around for long.' He thought to himself, watching the numerous quintessential strings come together in harmony.

And what held all of these quintessential strings together, was a beautiful purple luster, that seemed denser on some areas, and lighter on other areas.

'...The luster of destiny's love...' Damien assessed, 'The greater the luster, the more one is loved by Destiny, and the more those around them will benefit.'

And not too his surprise, there were many quintessential strings of purple lusters within this Stronghold. Adonis, Fiona, Sixth, Ninth, Bella (Third) were some of the very few.

Then there was also his parents, Juliette, and the other members of the Gray House.

"..."

Damien nodded, and finally comprehended enough about Fate and Destiny to try and manipulate it on the surface level. In simple terms, in the material plane.

His current body flew up higher and higher, and as he flew higher, the quintessential strings gathered closer and closer, whilst taking on a single direction.

At some point, they connected so closely together, they seemed no different than a thick gigantic quintessential string of various luminosity.

Damien finally stopped, but the thick quintessential string still went deeper and further into this unique void that he was in.

'It seems my mastery of both aspects hasn't reach a far enough level for me to gaze deeper into humanity's future.' He thought, and focused on what he could currently affect.

He wasn't planning on seeing the future anyway. He knew how terrifying it was to do that, especially when some powerful gods could feel you looking at them from whichever point of time you were at.

Let alone eldritch or outer beings. If he were to disturb one now, it would only make it more aware of this currently growing Realm, and him, as well.

'Safety first.' He thought, watching the thick quintessential string that represented the path of the Shade Stronghold glow with golden glory and splendor.

And on it, he saw multiple clouds of pink mist branching off, like some sort of branches on a stem. It was quite unique and beautiful. A one of a kind sight even for him.

In some cases, this cloud of pink mist affected the luminosity of the path of this Stronghold. Sometimes it was brightened, sometimes it dulled out.

And they were grouped up in segments. For example, a section of the quintessential string would have tens of branches on it. And from there, no more branches, then ahead, another segment of branches.

'So these are the parallel paths we would take while attempting to reach our final point of destiny..? And which one we will cross, depends on the interactions of all humans and their soroundings...'

Damien assessed the current lowest segment, which was his current time period, taking a glimpse at the first branch. This one depicted a path where the Shade King took in the Romanian Envoys as hostages.

This led to a future where he was secretly assassinated by the Gray House, then creating temporary discord within, and at some point, the eldest son killing the eldest sister.

Only to be killed by Bella when he attempted to kill Adriana. Adriana then took the throne, and took command of the whole city since Adonis and Alonis had yet to mature to manage the kingdom.

Unfortunately, she couldn't even prove herself as queen, before the wolves took the opportunity to swarm them, and almost 70% of the entire Stronghold was wiped out.

They won, true, but at great cost. Adonis and Fiona were completely affected, negatively at that, as they both lost loved ones in just a span of a few months time.

Meanwhile, Adriana died, resulting in Bella dying, which also caused Anne's death. The connection of fate was terrifying.

'...'

Damien stretched out his hand and cut off the entire path from the system, making it drift into nothingness moments later. '...It seems, nothing is ever perfect.'

He thought, moving onto the second branch. He was not going to let even one amongst all thirteen branches off, until he found one linear to his goals.

And after an arduous task of skimming, Damien finally found a path that was at least better off than the previous seven paths.

It was where the Shade King had by chance left, just as the Romanian Envoys arrived. This put them in an awkward position, as they were guests, but were unaware of their positions.

But Fiona still heavily interacted with Adonis, and they continued to plan out what they would do as King candidates, and also what Damien's view on them was currently at.

The Stronghold experienced tremendous growth under their secret management for the first two months. But problem would always bloom, as the eldest son used this to target Adonis.

He claimed that Fiona was here to secretly take over their home, and Adonis was helping her succeed. Which branded Adonis as a betrayer.

The eldest daughter joined him, but Alonis also joined Adonis, creating two major factions within the Stronghold. Adriana taking on a neutral standpoint.

By the beginning of the fourth month, the wolves attacked, and after half a year of arduous battles, only 50% of the Shade Stronghold was lost, that including the eldest son's faction.

Alonis wiped them out amidst their battle against the wolves. The decision was cruel, but it was vengeance, as they had done the same more than once.

Afterwards, everything went almost fine, and yeah, Damien stopped watching from there. 'At least, this is much better than the others... And the wolves. Maybe I should deal with them now?'

'They are becoming a major threat in all paths.' He thought, unfortunately, even the current him, felt extreme danger by just taking a look at the interior of their valley.

It was a strange feeling, as he knew only gods, and those favored by destiny, would make him feel this sense of danger.

But his view immediately changed when he viewed the ninth path. And even after watching the rest of them, he still felt like it was the best choice.

And without hesitation, he cut them all off, including the eight path, leaving behind the ninth one. 'This... hopefully, this takes the intended path I desire.'

He jumped into the pink cloud of mist, ready to manually manipulate fate and destiny. After all, him hoping, didn't mean he had nothing else he could try.

No. There was still more he could do.

He arrived within the same complex zone of quintessential strings linking and interacting with one another. But unlike before, they were illusory this time.

"..."

Damien watched all of them briefly, then checked his reserves of Kismetic Essence, and found that wiping out the twelve branches cost him 36 units in total.

He was now down to 31 units left. And he believed that they were enough.

'First, let us give the Shade King an epiphany.' He thought, burning out five units of Kismetic Essence to take the idea that the said man would have days from now, and projecting them to him now as a day dream of sorts.

'Anytime from now, he will see this as some sort of a great idea, and would definitely implement it.' He assessed, making sure to add glimpses of what path such a decision would result to.

But that was not all, he continued to burn out his Kismetic Essence to manipulate everything.

He made sure that the Shade King would not be able to meet the Romanian Envoys tonight, and would deal with them tomorrow.

He burned each and every unit of Kismetic Essence, to make this already great path, to even be greater than before.

He did not try to change the misunderstandings that would arise, the rivalries, the battles, none major. He just affected anything that would result in them losing more than necessary.