In the original game, the logic behind the time-limit mechanic for the final wrap-up event of Chapter One was cruel and realistic.
Players had to investigate clues and track her down to find Silvia's hiding spot within the allotted time.
Only by arriving within the time limit could they save her.
When players finally arrived before the countdown ended, they usually saw a specific scene:
Silvia lay in the center of a magic circle, still unconscious.
Beside her, the kidnapper, Professor Audrey, had fallen into a state of uncommunicative madness, entering a battle state the moment the player approached.
This naturally sparked a long-standing question in the player community:
Why did Professor Audrey, the kidnapper, devolve from a calculating criminal into a complete lunatic during the time the player was rushing to find her?
What exactly happened in that dilapidated woodcutter's cabin during the blank period while the player was desperately investigating and running around?
However, in the game's flow, players were destined never to find the answer through normal gameplay.
No matter if it was the second or third playthrough, and no matter how well they understood the causes or backgrounds, they couldn't skip the investigation and travel process.
Every time they pushed open that broken door, they were always met with a whispering, mad Audrey and an unconscious Silvia.
The process that led to Audrey's total mental collapse was forever sealed within the game's background time and the players' imaginations.
But that was just a game.
That was the original story following a fixed script and flow.
Now, this was reality.
Greg didn't follow the steps in the game.
He didn't investigate scattered clues, engage in long dialogues with NPCs, or run all over the academy.
Relying on his foreknowledge of the script, he took the shortest path directly to the destination he already knew.
Therefore, when he arrived on the scene, what he saw was subtly but crucially different from what a player arriving at the last second would see.
He saw Professor Audrey while she was still sane.
But at the same time, Greg felt a bit puzzled.
According to the original flow, Silvia should have been unconscious when the player arrived.
But right now, though Silvia was tied up, she was definitely awake, her face marked with tears and fear.
Was Silvia never meant to be unconscious the whole time? Or did something happen to her that would cause her to fall back into a coma?
This thought flashed through Greg's mind.
"Senior Greg...! Why are you here!?"
Silvia's voice trembled with the relief of a survivor and an unspeakable excitement.
Coming from an ordinary village, her childhood entertainment consisted of flipping through worn, yellowed fairy tale books bartered for at the market.
At this moment, Greg—standing against the moonlight and dust, appearing like he had torn through the darkness—instantly overlapped with the image of the princes in her memory who always appeared at the most critical moments to overcome all obstacles.
It felt as if as long as he was there, no matter how deep the despair, it could be dispelled; no matter how great the danger, it could be resolved.
The young girl was no longer afraid; instead, she felt an unprecedented sense of security.
Hearing her call, Greg momentarily withdrew his sharp gaze from Audrey and the surroundings.
He took a few steps to Silvia's side, knelt down, and nimbly began to untie the rough knots on her wrists and ankles.
"Didn't I say it before?"
He spoke without looking up as he worked on the ropes, his voice not loud but reaching Silvia's ears clearly:
"If you ever run into trouble... I'll definitely help you."
It was a very ordinary sentence, hardly even a promise.
But after falling into a near-bottomless abyss of despair, hearing those words again—words she had once heard in a dim dungeon corridor...
Silvia felt her heart being struck, hard yet tenderly, by something warm and powerful.
In this moment, she felt she finally understood what this emotion in her heart was.
"Greg... You're that Greg Sass?"
Professor Audrey's cold voice rang out again, carrying blatant disgust and the irritation of having her plans interrupted.
Although Greg hadn't taken her Magic History course, Audrey obviously recognized his face, as he was once a major celebrity in the academy.
"Many in the academy, myself included, thought you couldn't handle the humiliation and found some lonely corner to end your own life."
Audrey's gaze was like a cold knife scraping over Greg's dust-covered face:
"But I didn't expect you to still be clinging to life. Truly... an unpleasant tenacity."
Greg tossed the untied ropes aside, slowly stood up, and patted the dust off his hands. Only then did he look Audrey in the eye, his lips curling into a cold smile:
"A bad life is better than a good death. Doesn't an Associate Professor like you... understand such a simple principle?"
"You...!" Audrey was incensed by his indifferent retort, her brow furrowing deeply.
As a rigid and serious scholar, she had always detested delinquent students like Greg, who were unlearned and ill-behaved.
Now, not only had he interrupted her grand task, but he also dared to talk back with such an attitude—it was a double provocation!
"It seems you are exactly as others in the academy described: foolish and oblivious!"
Audrey's voice rose slightly with anger. She gripped the stone tablets and vials tighter, the madness in her eyes intensifying:
"You clearly noticed my movements, yet you didn't report to the academy. Instead, you chose to chase me here all by yourself... What? Do you really think a piece of trash like you, whose level is still pitifully stuck at LV10 in the second year, can stop me? You don't know your place!"
Heh, your info is way out of date. How long has it been since those records were updated?
The current me could thrash you with one hand, okay?
Greg was about to voice some mockery to release the resentment of his plans being disrupted.
But just then, Nightmare's ethereal voice, carrying a rare hint of seriousness, suddenly rang in his mind:
"My other half, put aside your pointless bickering for a moment. Look closely at the stone tablets she is clutching. Don't you think... the patterns on them look familiar?"
Hearing this, Greg immediately focused his gaze.
Looking closely, those stone tablets were dark in color, with a texture that was neither metal nor stone. Their edges were irregular, and their surfaces were etched with extremely complex, twisted patterns that seemed to pulse with a certain rhythm.
The flow and feel of the patterns on some of them...
They seemed to share similarities in style and certain basic configurations with the stone fragments Nightmare had been picking up from all over the dungeon and piecing together like treasures these past few days!
Rate on N.U.
