Leliot Reln

Leliot's life operated on a basis of need. If he felt like he didn't need to do something, he didn't want to do it, and usually he would not do it, or at least find a way to do it without requiring much effort. If he doesn't need to fight seriously, he will either run, negotiate, or fight with a handicap, such as putting his hands in his pockets.



[SPOILER="His Philosophy"]For Leliot, the most important thing is balance. Thus, he abhors prejudice, segregation, separation, nationalism, things like that. This not only applies to humans, but also apparitions known as ghosts and monsters and even the supernatural like gods and devils, or even just things that are classified as that with no actual information to make that judgment. However, he also hates blind and all-encompassing idolization, worship, devotion, anything based on the premise that they can't be bad in any way. To Leliot, no one deserves only hate, nor does anyone deserve only love, and in fact it is impossible to receive one without also receiving the other in some way. And yet, everywhere in the world there are those who don't believe they deserve one as they usually receive the other, and so Leliot makes it his duty to tell them they're wrong and that it's okay to be wrong to make things right.

Name: Gathering, Destiny Control (Destination Manipulation)

Gathering is an ability similar to Telekinesis that only pulls objects towards himself, and only if they are in an area he can sense, while unable to move anything away from himself. He is able to manipulate the things he has "gathered" only if they are within a few inches of his body. However, there is almost no limit on what he is capable of gathering. He can gather air, heat, light, poison, magic, anything physical and any energy that he can sense. Even time or emotions, if a user manipulates them like they were a substance instead of a concept, can be manipulated.

However, Leliot cannot gather a large amount of something all at once nearly as easily as gathering things in small amounts until it adds up to something large. Also, Leliot cannot gather anything living, unless it is something as small as blood cells or organisms of equal size like viruses or plankton, or just part of his own body. Nor can Leliot gather materials that are chemically or physically fused to something else individually.

Because this ability is limited to his body, it is very useful for close combat, however it is much more limited for the sake of long-range combat. One way to attack would be to gather something that is behind the opponent who is in front of Leliot. However, most things aren't usable as attacks unless Leliot gathers it into a refinable form. Even though he can gather stones, most opponents are able to dodge or defend against these very easily. A more certain method for long-range battle is available due to special trait called "Blood Body" in which any of his blood that is shed from him is an extension of his body that can be used as a "gathering point". A weakness is that the amount of blood shed is proportional to the amount and control of things to be gathered, thus any significant amount of gathering requires large amounts of blood that can leave Leliot anemic. Although, Leliot can still gather his own blood as well, so he can reuse and replace blood whenever he wants. Thus, Leliot can place blood so that an opponent can be a target of gathering or as checkpoints in order to "gather" himself to that location.

Destiny Control is a more powerful and more extensive version of Gathering in which Leliot can manipulate anything anywhere, not limited to just around his own body. However, he cannot access this whenever he wants, only when he enters his hypersensitive serious state that puts him at the same level as a god.

In a world of common fantasy and possibility, danger is prevalent and yet civilization is extensive. Leliot was born to a popular prostitute mother and a wandering adventurer father. Both their professions involved a type of secrecy and solitude, and so Leliot learned the importance of anonymity and the risk of fame. With too much fame, enemies swarm, and with anonymity, scandal can be avoided because it would almost never happen. Though not the worst or the best, his parents had a fair involvement and influence in both the "good" and the "bad" side of society. Exposed to many types of people and situations through city and wild life, Leliot had come to accept and not reject anyone of any race, class, species, fame, occupation, etc.

At the age of 3, Leliot was exposed to special bacteria in his lungs, and so he was crippled with a fatal and mutant form of asthma that would give him growing extreme pain for about an hour, growing more painful across his body from his lungs to the rest of his bloodstream, until it the point that it could actually kill him. To prevent his death, he took a special inhalant medicine that would put off the infection for 8 hours. However, if he were to be very stressed out or go through strenuous exercise, the time between asthma attacks would be shorter and shorter. Thus, he developed a calm and accepting persona in order to regulate his heart and body as much as possible. Thinking could cause stress as well, so Leliot grew skilled at thinking under pressure. As he reached the adolescent ages, around 12-14, his body changed, but his disease changed with it, growing more prolific and infecting his body faster and more painfully than before, each medicine time only being 3 hours at most.

A side effect of Leliot’s disease was that his sense of taste was crippled. He could still taste food but only if it had enough flavor or impact, but that was extremely rare for him. He still wanted to taste good food, but he could not easily obtain the food he knew he could taste, so instead he decided to learn how to make food with that level of taste himself. He trained himself and with the help of the cooks who made the food he could taste to create cuisine that he could consider tasteful, even delicious. Because his own sense of taste is so weak, the food he made that he could barely taste was considered delectable and extremely delectable by others.

For the first 14 years of his life, he could not access his ability, where abilities are needed for the sake of survival, and any other way is regarded as inferior. As someone without an ability, he had to work hard to be able to match others with only pure physical prowess and skill. Thus he studied and practiced with many techniques and helpful concepts that he could make use of in order to defeat or outsmart his enemies in any way possible. He learned about body anatomy to a frightening degree, in order to attack joints or pressure points and move his body in the most efficient way possible. He trained his reflexes to react as best as possible, his senses to sense the most minuscule stimuli and stimuli difference, his movements to be free of waste and sound in order to move without being tired or detected and deadly accuracy that, with his other skills, application was quick and unnoticed. Although, much of his studies or training were always hands-on experiences that he never originally intended to have happen, and yet he did learn and apply his knowledge and experience every chance he got, which were many, though not always without consequence. And of course, these instances were made all the more difficult with his disease slowly killing him multiple times a day. So with his life on the line constantly being an issue in his life, it was no wonder he operated on a need-based premise.

Nevertheless, the limits of a human body without an ability could only go so far. It was only through the acquisition of his ability that Leliot did not die young, for every moment before and every day after he feared death, and many times faced death, and so he refused to die to the point that he gained the ability to ensure he and anyone with him will not die. Around Leliot were many amazing fighters and ability users with great power that Leliot could not defeat, and many times he was able to befriend them or at least not make enemies out of them. But even they could not face gods or devils or beings on par with their power, so it was all the more impossible that when beings of such power attacked, no one could do anything, and no way did Leliot think he could be of any help. Though he had been aware of it for awhile, he was not one to make any real contribution, public or private, nor was he someone of significant birth or circumstance compared to legends or leaders of the world. He knew, that if he died, then nothing he did would really matter to the world or even the universe as a whole. And yet, he didn't want to die, nor did he want his friends and family or anyone at all to die either. Thus, he turned this fear of death, into rejection, refusal, aggression, passion, into a full-out war against the coming of death.

In this world of fantasy and possibility, in every being that came or comes to exist lives the ever evolving aspect of potential that when accessed allows for the actualization of every possible form of power and capability that made gods and monsters and all other such things reality rather than pieces of non-existent imagination. However, to even grasp the possibility of change is tremendously difficult, requiring the congregation and abundance of many beings' conviction and determination to do so. And what more conviction can be found than a single human's desire to initiate his collection and understanding of thousands of being's yearning to live and the many circumstances and existences that operate the universal cycle of violent unfairness and uncontrollable chaos. And so, in a state of euphoric and unrelenting sincerity, Leliot gained and utilized for the first time the ability of Destiny Control (which would operate in his daily life as Gathering) saving his city's residents and the lives they could now live once more.

Now, Leliot continues to perfect his ability as he travels the world for fun and adventure, occasionally coming back to give thanks to his home community for making him what he is and helping him be what he always wanted to be: truly great. With his great cooking abilities he would go on to have a successful cooking career, giving him the money to travel as he pleases. And so Leliot would involve himself in many more adventures, even meeting and defeating gods and devils and other fantastic situations that continue to intrigue Leliot and remind him that life is indeed worth every second of the experience.

Asthmatic superhuman condition:
He carries dangerous bacteria in his body that gives him a severe asthmatic condition that does not allow him to breathe normally after several hours, the microscopic invaders slowly and painfully spreading throughout his bloodstream from his lungs until it reaches his brain.

The safe period grows shorter and shorter the more stressed he is and the more exercise he does. He uses a specific substance to slow and stop the spread for the next safe period as it relieves pain, ingesting it through a medicinal cigar presently, or even a pipe if he's feeling fancy, but through a special inhaler in his younger years. During those years, his safe period was about 8 hours or more depending, but after his adolescent period, the bacteria became more unstable and rampant, so he had to use medicinal cigarettes that were more potent than the simple inhaler. The medicine makes the bacteria dormant while making his immune system more effective in clearing it away from the places it spreads to, though not completely before they pass remission.

Fortunately, the bacteria binds to its host specifically, so once Leliot was infected, he could not spread it to those around him. The pathogen seems to have different effects for different people, although great pain and need of treatment is common. The infection rate is rare but those who can bear the pain and get treatment without dying are even more rare.

The constant damage the condition causes and the peculiar nature of the bacteria have forced his body cells to adapt to be stronger and more able to heal and transport nutrients and information than the average human being. This gives him heightened strength, durability, healing, speed, reaction time, as well as stamina/endurance (though this in particular is still lowered by his condition to worse than average). This condition is similar to the "superman syndrome" in which some people are born with a large amount of dense muscle fibers that give them great strength with a normal sized body, but for Leliot that was given through years of pain, cellular reconstruction and near-death situations over many years. While his physical specs are much better than most humans, they are still not on the level of superhumans, but he tries to make up for it with technique and skill. With this, he also has a high tolerance of pain, though he would still prefer not to feel any.

This condition has robbed him of most of his sense of taste and part of his sense of smell, but as a result his other senses are enhanced a good bit, especially after the condition had forced his body to essentially evolve.

Because of his greater bodily processes, he requires more sustenance to compensate, so he tends to eat large quantities of food, the calories of which he can burn through quickly after fights and other such strenuous activity.
These qualities developed over his life, not being as severe or different from normal asthma in the beginning.

High Intelligence and calculative mind:
His mind is able to analyze and incorporate information incredibly quickly. Inherited from his mother. As his senses improved and his bodily makeup evolved from his condition, so too did his processing capability. To the point that he is able to think in a way that time can feel like it moves slowly, able to take in hours worth of information in seconds, this great expansion of his mental capacity has made it as if he has lived much longer than his actual age.

Eyes of Will:
When he gets serious, his blue eyes turn purple and can eventually be magenta. This is due to a special chemical reaction of the bacteria and the adrenaline hormones that result from a high-stress situation as well as the reconfigured makeup of his eyes from his enhanced condition. Due to conquering his many near-death experiences, he is somewhat able to access adrenaline of his own accord even if he doesn't totally feel like he is in danger, allowing him to reach a higher level of body functionality at a moment's notice.

When his eyes are purple, he reaches a state called "Spirit Burst" and it is estimated he is at least 30% serious, his body, mind, and abilities boosted accordingly in response to his will to push his body past his normal limits. This state allows him to manually repress his condition without his medicine and access his abilities easily to a greater extent than normal. However, without the pain relieving effects of the medicine, his body will continue to go through agonizing pain if not properly treated.

When his eyes are magenta, he reaches the state called "Spirit Epitome" where he is about 100% serious, but this is usually reached for only an instant. While it can be steadily reached after growing more focused and serious in Spirit Burst state, it is also reached if he needs to prevent his or someone else's death in only a fraction of time after not being serious at all. For example, in the fraction of a second he can reflexively attain Spirit Epitome immediately, as he perceives the entirety of the situation and calculates and acts accordingly, he can precisely flick a coin to hit the side of a bullet after it was already shot in such a way that the bullet hits the gun out of an enemy hand without hurting that hand or letting it prematurely pull the trigger, without having the coin hit anyone either, as seen in this video.

He likes new experiences and tends to seek them out instead of whatever tasks he might be in the middle of but knows he doesn't have to be present for. He spends most of his time traveling around the world. He would be observant and patient when confronted with a dangerous situation, and faced with many of those, he became used to changes in his life, adaptive to anything new.

However, because he is used to many things, he easily gets bored and seeks to find things to entertain him.

He doesn't like socializing if the situation doesn't call for it, so he hardly has any friends, but he is fine with that to an extent.

In order to lessen the strain of his lung condition, he adopted a calm and aloof persona, as even a quick battle could trigger an attack if he gets unnecessarily excited. However, he does still feel emotions like any normal person, and while he can repress them easily, those emotions do still build up and can be let out from time to time to a very extreme degree, especially if multiple things he doesn't like are happening one after another. Of course, he does consider everything that happens around him, so even if he flips out, it will usually be for something justified without too many consequences, even if he wreaks havoc seemingly without a care.

In order to find the most efficient ways to take down enemies, Leliot researched weak points of specific techniques and body anatomy and other such things, and thus he tended to look for weaknesses and general structure of anything he observes, especially other people. He will exploit those weaknesses anytime he can, at times going too far, and will thus make people threatened by him uncomfortable very often.

He doesn't really care about others unless they threaten him, his friends and family, and his plans, so he usually doesn't care what he says or does around them, within social norms of course.

He likes to keep things interesting and prepare himself for various situations, so he has several self imposed rules to discipline himself and prevent things from getting too boring.
[SPOILER="Rules"]
Battle:
- Never use full power from the start. Have levels of fighting styles or restrictions to match the situation.

- For any battle he has the time or capability for, keep hands in pockets to have a kick-based fighting style, dodging to avoid damage

- If time is very limited, use hands to make things go quicker or more precisely done, using parries and counters to avoid damage and accurate attacks to opponent pressure points

- Do not use abilities if not needed

- If a certain element or perceived ability is implied to be under control, continue using that limited ability as much as possible to fool opponents into thinking they can see the limits of your abilities

- Use hands or specific body parts to display ability as much as possible. Do not let opponent know that Gathering is not limited to what body part is used

- Do not Gather from living things or living things themselves, unless maybe from himself (while this is another limit that would be beneficial to imply to his opponent, it also is best to not directly affect others as it is too easy to make lethal mistakes and hurt them more than help)

- Never kill when possible, as many enemies can be negotiated with or redeemed, and some deserve more than death. Either way there is always more to do than end things so soon

Etc.
- Never lie, but never tell the full truth if not needed. He likes to make people believe everything he says is the truth, but he also likes to play around with what exactly he means without lying in order to not break promises and such.

- Don't stand out as much as possible. That is more attention and exposure that is not needed and may invite more enemies that could be avoided otherwise. Always try to give the reputation to someone else, especially if that is their job.

- If you have no choice but to stand out, do so under an alias and/or different appearance

- Always try to take noiseless steps. Doing so improves stealth and strength control, even if subconsciously

Catchphrase: "Well, I'm sure something terrible will happen."

He understands that trial is necessary to improve, and many misfortunes are there to test people, to bring need for change against misfortune, that good things can come of bad events and vice versa. He knows this is a negative phrase, but he tends to use it positively, like some kind of motivational quote, because he knows that everywhere, good and bad events will happen to all kinds of people at the same time, all the time. Of course, there are different things people think are good and things they think are bad, so what one person thinks is good may be what another would think is bad. So a bad thing will definitely happen during a good thing, maybe even in the same place, and Leliot knows that people do not like to think of that, but he doesn't want to deny this everyday occurrence. And, coupled with his belief in trials, ultimately good things can come out of bad events, and saying his phrase can, in a way, motivate him to make something good out of something bad, even if people can't or won't see it. Of course, things can still end badly overall, in his opinion, so he would be right regardless, but in that case he wouldn't be happy about it, even if others are as they think it was good, so he will likely go and do something to make it good, even if it's for his own sake, however long it may take.

Cooking:
Because his affliction took away most of his sense of taste, most foods taste fairly bland to him, whether they be delicious or disgusting to everyone else. He mainly had to judge food based on texture, temperature, and spiciness as it is more of a feeling of pain than taste. Though he was fine with that limited palette as long as he could continue to survive, he ultimately grew jealous that others enjoyed themselves and frustrated that he could not sympathize with their experiences, so he decided to study and practice cooking until he could create dishes he could actually taste. He eventually succeeded and achieved skills on the levels of top-class professionals, though to him they were simply enough to stimulate his taste buds. Nonetheless, having finally enjoyed the joys of flavor, he strives to further his abilities to satisfy his curiosity and lavish in deliciousness. He would also improve his cooking speed and find ways to shorten preparation time as he was a bit impatient in wanting food, as it was some of the only things he can taste. Of course, they were luxuries to others, and seeing their elated expressions (or nauseous regret from his explorations of bad tastes) he grew to enjoy cooking for others, and so became a professional chef with his own restaurant, but his love of traveling had him be a free-lance chef who could leave it to be managed by his sous-chef.

Voice mimicry and ventriloquism:
Because of his lung condition, he looked into ways to breathe more efficiently in ways to lessen the burden. In doing so, he also found ways to manipulate his vocal chords to make his voice different, similar to others, as well as at a distance from himself without moving his mouth too much. It wasn't perfect, but it was still pretty convincing, and his ability improved his range and authenticity greatly.

Skill Mastery:
He can learn and do anything he wants at near-master levels much quicker than others due to his vast knowledge and experience of trying out different things to make himself stronger or satisfying his curiosity of different skills, learning very quickly but forgetting just as quickly after not applying those skills for a long time. This is also due to how he devotes his time to doing things, tending to spend all his available time in order to fulfill his curiosity, spending all-nighters to figure out everything he can simply because he finds it interesting.

Leliot had no supernatural ability until he was 14.

"Gathering" is an ability similar to telekinesis in which he can move things without touching them, however it does not strictly use his mind and is limited to bringing things toward himself to a point on his body. Any further kind of manipulation is limited to several inches from his physical body, and no further, and the amount of things he can gather is more or less the amount of strength his physical body can lift or move.

He will often use his hands for his ability, and while it is not totally necessary to move them at all, it helps him concentrate and picture what he wants to do better, also he thinks it's fun.

A characteristic he possesses is "Blood Body" in which his blood, even if separated from his body, is still considered part of his body and is thus able to use Gathering as well, although at a much more limited capacity than normal usage. The extent of the blood's ability to use Gathering is dependent mainly on density and Leliot's will to have the blood use it.

Gathering excels in choice and variety. He can gather anything he can perceive, including heat, fire, electricity, air, radiation, mana, spiritual matter, etc., and he can also gather only specific materials even if it is mixed with other substances. He can manipulate these materials separately and in such a way they don't touch each other nor leak out and even keep things gathered on him for long periods of time to use for later.

From using his ability, he gained a sort of omniscient sixth sense that can scan the structure and composition of things around him even if they are blocked with obstacles, as it helps him find and select the specific things he wants to gather. The range can be adjusted but it is difficult to use for long ranges, as sensing every single thing that makes up every single object even on the atomic level and comprehending the difference between all of those things in order to find what he needs can be an ocean of information to analyze within a short period of time. But, with Leliot's inhuman mental processing and with the boost from his serious states, he can analyze that information without overloading his mind. Although, this "aura of omniscience" too can be adjusted to be specific or general depending on his needs, only perceiving specific substances or sensing things like he was looking or hearing them normally, either in a specific direction or directions or every direction. This aura is hard for others to detect as it is not visible or tangible to anyone but him, but it is not totally undetectable.
[SPOILER="Useful applications of this ability include:"]
- Taking the heat away from a hot area, and using that heat to warm up within a cold area. Taking heat from something can also freeze that thing. And by keeping things close to him or with a clever application of blood (not in the food tho, but like on the outside of the container), he can maintain the heat level of hot food or frozen desserts for indefinite periods of time, and even make it so the heat or lack of heat doesn't affect things around it, so Leliot can grab the foods without consequence
- Cleaning an area of filth, allowing efficient vacuuming and mopping even if it's a dried stain on cloth or carpet, and can dry objects or himself if they get wet. He can take specks out of his eyelids, earwax from his ear, splinters from his skin, glass from carpet, etc. This also allows the purification of liquids, making for clean water, and purification of gases, making for no pollution or gas-based harm like at those camps to concentrate better.
- Gathering air to stay close to his body even at specific atmospheric pressures, allowing him to swim in ocean depths or stay in space for long periods of time
- Gathering light for illumination, enough of it can be used for a laser-like attack like a magnifying glass over ants on a hot day, or a simple flashbang. By gathering light from far away and manipulating it to be comprehensible to his eyes to process, he can see very long distances clearly
- Gathering sound from far away to wiretap and to use for
- Gathering smells from far away and to use for traps and stink bombs
- Gathering material onto his skin and facial features, allowing him to disguise himself easily, hide injuries like the facial scar of his youth, strengthen his body like armor that can also have material atop to look like skin
- Gathering metal, glass, plastic, liquids and using heat to craft things as he wants
- Manipulating the air and light around him to create illusions or make himself invisible
- Moving his limbs even if his brain doesn't send signals to them or if he is too physically tired to move them. He can also move them beyond normal human capacity to achieve great feats of strength and speed, and by strengthening his body with tough materials, manipulating the area around him to lessen strain from air friction and pressure, and keeping his body parts intact as they move at superhuman speeds, he can lessen the damage and strain despite his human body
- Removing poisons, viruses, harmful cells, radiation, and other materials from an afflicted body.
- Consciously and manually distributing blood or just oxygen and other types of nutrients throughout the body, even if body parts are damaged or separated, allowing Leliot to appear dead even if his head is cut off or his heart is taken out

Manipulation of body parts without harming the body is very complex and requires a thorough knowledge and awareness of bodily pathways like veins, arteries, nerves, etc. that Leliot cannot perform easily, so even if he can cure others of diseases and afflictions, it is a risky process that may be even more difficult than major surgeries and requires a high state of concentration. After thorough and repeated review of and application of his ability on his own body, Leliot can perform these processes on his own body much more easily, almost subconsciously.

Also of course using his ability and his omniscient aura, he can cook food quicker and easier, able to manipulate the ingredients, seasoning, environment, heating, all even without equipment, although using equipment is still less troublesome than manipulating every single thing with your mind, and he is more used to the old-fashioned way after all. If he wanted to, he can prepare extravagant and tedious recipes within minutes, maybe less.

He was born to a prostitute mother and adventurer father.

His mother was part of a brothel managed by the Madame, who was a kind leader who treated her employees with respect. The Madame would take care of women with certain kinds of trouble, whether it be sexual abuse, kidnapping, slavery, poverty, debt, discrimination, bad circumstances in general, so even if Leliot's mother had given birth, the Madame would allow her to take care of him at the same time like many others before or after her. The brothel had numerous rooms and deals with local inns for special room service. While his mother worked at the brothel, his father would often be on another adventure, seldom but still coming home to visit his family, providing for their living expenses with his bounty rewards and treasure sales. Leliot and his mother would stay in a room at an inn that was near a poor but decent neighborhood that was filled with many diverse races and species of fantastic origin, all somewhat reviled by normal humans of better areas but accepting of each other and the many abilities, characteristics, and hardships they all shared. As a result, Leliot would grow up around other kids of various origins and come to accept those unlike him.

When he was only 3 years old, he was infected with a bacterial pathogen that caused something akin to asthma, only much more painful and quicker to cause attacks even without hyperventilation. Having developed a deep love for their son and duties of a parent, Leliot's mother and father acquired the treatment needed to alleviate his condition with their connections and . However, the condition was uncurable, and treatment substance was expensive due to rarity and needed to be refilled monthly, so she worked overtime in order to help Leliot. She possessed a high IQ and great decision making skills, so she was able to rise up to an advisor role to the Madame, even contributing to make the brothel to a high-class and influential center of the gentrified area it was located at, even allowing expansion and franchising over many years.

As a kid, he couldn't help but be excited and passionate about things, but learns that being too excited is bad for his health because of his condition. However, Leliot would test his limits of how far he could go in various different circumstances, and develop a resistance to exciting events that get his heart pumping, but not a totally calm persona that seems unmoving and stoic, until his adolescence where his childlike passion would naturally calm down, knowing he didn't need to be expressive, prioritizing his philosophy of need versus want and such.

At this point, he did not have his special ability, so he used weapons and studied various fighting styles, anatomy, and general underhanded tactics to be on par with those around him that did. He also practiced cooking in order to stimulate his dull taste buds, and was able put his knife skills to good use.

When he was 9, his mother had been kidnapped by a rival underworld gang whose own businesses of drug and sex trafficking was being hampered by the Madame's successful brothel taking away business and products. Leliot joined the security team assigned to rescue her as someone who could infiltrate their headquarters and free her from her captives while the rest dealt with the opposing security. He ended up facing an opponent who was much stronger and more experienced than him or anyone else he had faced up to that point and his condition had greatly hampered him from putting up a good fight as he tried to figure out what to do. Unable to find a solid plan of attack, but unwavering from his will to save his mother, he awakened to his first "Spirit Burst" and was able to incapacitate his opponent despite grave injuries and a slash across his left eye, where a scar would remain. Though he nearly died, he had saved his mother.

He spent the years studying, sparring, cooking, almost dying but surviving another day either through a tough fight or his condition getting the better of him. Though he faced trials, he overcame them, and as he grew up he felt that no matter what happens, he could find a way to deal with it. He was getting smarter, stronger, more skilled, and more experienced, slowly gaining great confidence and a mischievous attitude to match. Yet, deep inside his heart he knew what he had wasn't enough. His cooking still had almost no flavor to him, and his tricks could barely overcome his opponents' abilities that he envied but could not have for himself. He was capable, yes, but he was still a child at heart, naïve and easily frustrated but couldn't express himself due to his disease and the pride he had for matching the more powerful around him. It didn't help that the safe period for his bacteria attacks were getting shorter and shorter as he went through adolescence. Like a budding teenager, he felt like fate was unfairly against him as he tried desperately to live day to day while others enjoyed privileges he could not afford or obtain. He would not know that those weren't enough to stop fate from actually bearing down on everything he ever knew later on.

One day, when Leliot was 14, the earth spit anger at the sky, and the sky rained despair on the earth. The day had come, where everything around him was ending. He had grown up around many powerful people, but even they were unable to totally drive back or stop what was happening. Extremely furious with being unable to do anything, but selfishly wanting to do something for the sake of everyone else, Leliot shouts with all he can against the threat he confronts, unwilling to confront the death of all he had done or ever would do. Everyone was fighting around him to stop the end from coming, to stop the forces from killing them, and he would not let those efforts and feelings go to waste. And so, as his will resonated with those around him and with the sheer divine wrath that was about to lay down the apocalypse, the universe itself warped and the nature of everything looked at this young boy who wanted to make all that was around him move to his favor for the sake of others and decided that he might just be able to handle that responsibility. So, in that moment, without anyone else knowing, Leliot's command had moved destiny away from stopping there and continued forward.
After that day, he had the ability he would later name "Gathering".


After the events that gave him his ability, he could not readily use it as he wanted. He would spend the following years trying to understand it and how he could use it, all while keeping it secret as no one knew it was his power that saved that day, knowing that it's more advantageous to have a hidden card unlike the power users he had beaten in the past whose abilities he knew and took advantage of. Though he now had an ability he can access, he knew relying entirely on it would make his physical skills rusty, so he would practice mixing things up, even incorporating his abilities into his fighting style.

He decided that there was still much for him to learn, especially outside his home district, so he would try his hand at attending a school to learn various subjects of science to better make use of his ability and expand his skill set. Luckily, the school he chose had an abundance of materials and experts and only needed an entrance exam to enter, which he passed easily, so it didn't matter if he didn't have a formal education up to that point. However, having gone there he studied most things very quickly and students around him had a hard time of keeping up to his level, which was fair as he had an accelerated intellect boosted by a rare health condition. He became impatient and decided to finish everything as quick as possible, completing secondary and collegiate schooling in two years each and ending up with a simple teaching degree from what he learned as he helped his classmates, but still not sure if he wanted to be a full-time teacher just yet, especially at his age.

His mother recommended him to use his cooking skills to have a stable career, so Leliot started his own restaurant in the urban city nearby which he called "Easy Pleasings" or "Z-Pleas" as it would be called for short. While his mother helped with most of the management and employing attractive waitresses that were also taken in by the Madame but didn't necessarily want to sell their bodies, his father would supply a portion of the ingredients, while Leliot insisted he would get a good amount himself. Luckily, his teaching degree made it easier for him to understand how to convey his complex recipes to his employees, so he could leave it to them if he had an asthma attack and needed to take a break.


Z-Pleas would be so successful that other locations could be opened in other cities that Leliot didn't have to be in, with sous-chefs he could trust that could cook his dishes for him being in charge and managing things. He had a good amount of wealth that he had made for himself, not having to rely on his mother and father anymore, and decided to continue traveling around the world in order to have little adventures for himself, experiencing the world personally and not through books and stories he grew up with. Sometimes he would be a cook for struggling restaurants or rich events that needed someone of his talent, sometimes he would be a teacher at schools for combatants or supernatural ability users. He would often go around intruding on the affairs of others if they interested him, especially if they had the potential to be something great that he wouldn't let go wasted by unfortunate circumstances. Of course, even if they were to become great heroes, company owners, country leaders, celebrity actors, passionate revolutionaries, the gods of their lands, whatever happened he would not use them for his own fame and fortune, in fact he would even be the villain or some other necessary evil to drive these people to be who they truly deserve. As long as he could bring out the best of them, and make some good relationships and connections for his hometown and restaurant along the way, he was fine not being the star in their story. After all, everyone has their part to play, and every good star needs a great supporting cast, even if they seem like the better choice in some form or another.