Chapter 999: Sensing the Strands

"If you reach that limit and the strand breaks, there's a good chance that your body will be shredded up as the cause of this disturbance." Chronos said as Shiro stayed silent for a moment before opening her mouth.

"Yes but this is the only way to use this power without straining my body more than needed. Plus, the drain of expanding the strand around me will be high so I doubt that I'll be able to reach that stage in the first place. But just in case I do, how about we place a limiter on the runes then? We'll make it so that I can't surpass the set amount and it will force me out of the time stop." Shiro suggested as Chronos furrowed his brows but nodded his head.

"Alright, I'll do some calculations and figure out a decent limit for you then. Since I doubt you'll be satisfied with just one second." Chronos chuckled as Shiro nodded her head.

"In the meantime, you should work on improving your familiarity with the river of time. You can't use mana or divine energy right now but you should get used to the feeling and sensing it. Otherwise even if you have the theory down, it'll be hard for you to accomplish anything if you can't sense the river of time." Chronos said as Shiro nodded her head.

Sitting down, she closed her eyes and tried to sense the strands surrounding her. This room was made just for their study session so Chronos made sure to mark out the strands with his own energy. As long as she can pick up on them it shouldn't be too hard for her to feel the presence of the strands.

With Shiro trying to sense the strands, Chronos walked away so that he could put her theory to the test. Since his physique was a little special, he should be able to attempt her method without any problems.

Flexing his fingers, a tier 8 magic circle appeared around him as runes started to form on the layers.

But the moment he tried to expand the surroundings, he noticed a big problem. The control needed for this is much bigger than his previous method. If one does not stay dead centre they'll also be subjected to the effects. You are either slowed down to a halt like your surroundings or accelerated to the next moment. Regardless, you will just be wasting a large portion of mana for nothing while also disorientating yourself.

In a fight, this could be the moment that your enemy is looking for and end your life in a single slash.

However, Chronos had to admit that even if the controls are delicate, the stress it puts on your body is much lower than his method. If anything, it could almost be called a massage.

Cracking his neck, he figured that he might as well try to achieve some success with this method so that Shiro knows it's possible.

###

While Shiro and Chronos were training in the chamber, Nyx recovered enough to sit up and glanced towards Hemera.

Feeling her heart squeeze in pain, Nyx sighed and brushed Hemera's hair.

"Where's Chronos?" Nyx asked as Ouranos glanced over.

"He's with Shiro right now. She used her skill to increase her authority level and made an avatar to see us. Chronos is teaching her how to control an aspect of time right now." Ouranos replied while helping Tartarus research his wound.

"Wait Shiro is here?" Nyx widened her eyes in surprise.

Furrowing her brows, Nyx sighed since it wasn't exactly reassuring seeing her backers in this state.

"How long has it been?" Nyx asked.

"2 weeks. You've been unconscious for two weeks this time. Next time it might become three weeks." Ouranos replied.

"Three weeks…" Nyx muttered but shook her head.

"Has Chronos found anything out about the Nytri we saw in Aria's fear?" She asked as that was the only clue they had to where Aria's tier 9 power came from. If they could find out the origin, they'll be able to find out Aria's history.

"Unfortunately no. He's been trying to glance into the past but his sight is limited." Ouranos shook his head.

"He tried divination with some help but nothing of the sort popped up. It's as though the event never happened but it definitely did since it's Aria's source of fear."

Hearing this, Nyx fell silent.

Her spell wouldn't work with illusions that the person had seen or something that they imagined so it proved that this was a real event. But the fact that they couldn't find anything on it was strange. Plus, it didn't seem like Shiro knew what happened either since she hasn't reached god hood never mind talking down to a goddess like that.

"It's strange…" Nyx muttered as Ouranos agreed.

"Perhaps we should set it aside for now since we need to focus on healing Gaia and Tartarus. Their wounds are strange, healing is reduced and even their divine core is damaged. Thankfully, there are signs of repair but I'm afraid that if they were hit in the vitals, they would definitely die or stay injured with hardly any chance of recovery." Ouranos replied as he narrowed his eyes at the runes.

It was as though it rejected divine energy entirely so all they could do was use low level spells to try to repair or stabilise everything while their divine core slowly repaired itself.

"Hais… alright." Nodding her head, Nyx stood up and started to help Ouranos with finding a counter for the runes.

###

Shiro didn't know how long it's been but she could sense Chronos' power flowing through her body. In the darkness, there were flickers of light that would appear in her vision but whenever she tried to reach out to grab it, it would disappear.

Swimming around her like fishes, Shiro felt as though she was in a lake but was anchored down.

Something stopped her from flowing freely like them but there was this burning desire to reach out to them.

She wanted to see through the darkness but the moment she opened her eyes, she would be back in the room. She wanted something to let her interact with the river of time.

Slowly, without her notice, faint red circuits appeared on her hand and started to travel up her arm.

Looking at the flickering lights, Shiro continued to reach out to no avail.

Waves upon waves of forces pushed her away preventing her from reaching out as she wasn't able to come close to grabbing them.

However, she suddenly felt a burning sensation on her arm which flowed towards her neck.

Just as she was about to open her eyes, she felt a blindfold of sorts cover her eyes.

"Mother, let me help." A mature voice rang out softly as Shiro flinched for a moment.

Gritting her teeth, it felt like a needle was stabbed into her eyes as pain filled her body but it was short lived before a cool sensation replaced the pain.

'Who are you?' Shiro asked as she could no longer sense the other person nor could she hear them. All she felt was the cool sensation in her eyes as her instincts told her to direct what little energy she had felt towards her eyes.

Suddenly, the flickering lights started to become clear as strings could be seen floating around her.

Looking at these strings, Shiro had the urge to reach out towards them.

Just as she touched one of the strings, she felt Chronos tap her shoulder.

Opening her eyes, she glanced up and saw Chronos' concerned expression.

"Did something happen?" Shiro asked as Chronos sighed.

"You were about to fast forward time. How did you even come to this stage?" He asked with worry since she shouldn't have the energy to do this yet he definitely saw that she was doing the motions required. That sudden spike in energy he felt was the river of time reacting.

"Eh? I did? I don't know, I just saw a string and felt the urge to pluck it." Shiro furrowed her brows. She didn't recognise the voice of the one who called her mother, but she definitely felt that something had happened to her eyes.

"Chronos do you have a mirror?" Shiro asked as Chronos nodded his head.

Snapping his fingers, a reflective surface appeared in front of her as Shiro could see that there were faint purple runes around her pupil. Unless one looked carefully, they wouldn't notice it.

Trying to push energy towards her eyes once more, she saw the runes flicker for a moment before dulling out once more.

"That's strange… Let me look at the system." Shiro muttered before glancing at her interface.

However, her system didn't say anything about this which was strange since the system usually recorded everything that happened.

Explaining the situation to Chronos, the god furrowed his brows as this was indeed strange. For her to be able to suddenly interact with the river of time was definitely attributed to her eyes which let her see the strands but the origin was veiled in mystery.

"Chronos, are you able to transfer me some energy so that I can test out these eyes?" Shiro asked as she wanted to find out what they are.

Hearing this, Chronos paused for a moment before nodding his head.

"Alright."