Chapter 15
Chapter 15
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 15
Chapter Title: Epilogue and Prologue
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If time rewinds in the Tower, many things will change. Whether those changes will create any meaningful difference, I'm not sure.
First and foremost, the relationship between the Tower and the Abyss will shift.
The Abyss will still seek to bring the world to an end, while the Tower will strive to keep it going.
It's a difference in perspective, a clash of beliefs.
The Abyss believes the world should be completely ended and started anew.
The Tower, on the other hand, wants to preserve the world its god created.
In terms of difficulty, the former is easier.
Sometimes, when there are too many things broken, it's better to demolish and rebuild than to repair.
In fact, the former succeeded, and the latter failed. That's the situation we're in now.
If you think about it, it looks like the Abyss gave it a pass once.
You could say it granted one more chance out of a desire for the Tower to prove itself wrong.
The Tower never evolved its initial system anyway.
Only some of the NPCs will experience the regression alongside us.
Those like Ber, who have earned representative titles or nicknames, have more than enough qualification.
It's judged that they've gained a modicum of dignity.
Without that dignity, they couldn't even withstand the regression itself.
"But if that's the case, won't the future inevitably get twisted?"
"Why?"
"I mean, we're not losing our memories or our power. If we actively intervene, the future has to twist no matter what."
I shook my head at Ber's words.
"We won't be able to intervene actively. Our intervention is only permitted right at the beginning."
The only time we can make meaningful changes after regression is in the early stages.
Even that was achieved under conditions like stripping away my existing authority and the Sun's administrator role.
After that, we can't touch the Tower's systems.
"The more people experience the regression, the stronger Time's elasticity will become."
Normally, creating a '1' requires energy equal to 1. After regression, it takes 10 times the energy to create the same '1'.
In the beginning, that energy restriction is temporarily lifted.
"So more isn't necessarily better."
"If it's too few, they won't be able to withstand Time's elasticity at all. They'd probably forget everything right away."
"It's tricky. And kinda scary."
Ber groaned, clutching her forehead beside me.
Dark circles stretched long under her eyes.
"Ugh, why is this so hard?"
"I told you it was difficult."
"My eyes are gonna fall out."
She stretched out her words, melting over the desk like she was collapsing.
"Compared to the work you handle, this is nothing."
I couldn't fathom what she was complaining about while running shops on a near-corporate scale.
"That's different from this. I'm good with numbers."
"Shut up and drink your coffee."
I set a cup of coffee in front of the whining Ber. She must be weak to sleep deprivation, judging by how she was acting like a kid.
"So, how do you plan to use this opportunity we've gained?"
She asked without even lifting her face, just waving her arm.
"I'll add the concept of Constellations to the existing system."
"Constellations? Like the ones in novels?"
Her head popped up at the word, curiosity piqued as she stared at me.
"It's a kind of loophole. This way, we can exert influence continuously."
It's not creating a new function from scratch. Just expanding an existing one.
Plus, providing rewards for free is impossible anyway, so it balances out to some extent. Rewards require payment in return.
Outright ridiculous support isn't feasible.
Assuming there's a process and a result, Time only enforces the result.
We need to twist the process as much as possible to stray from the original outcome.
"Our job is to turn the flap of a butterfly's wings into a storm."
"Whoa, that sounds tough."
She replied with a deflating sigh.
The butterfly effect makes it sound easy, but calculating it all would make your head explode.
"That's why we need to stir up as much chaos as possible. Don't give them time to recover. Hit them relentlessly, and cracks will form bit by bit, pulling us further from the original future."
"Easier said than done."
"Even saying it has to be easy. Brainwash yourself if you have to. Otherwise, you won't last."
Ber's face twisted slightly.
"Sigh, so we're creating Constellations. Is that it?"
"No, we'll also set up departments inside the Tower."
Similar to Constellations, but different.
It has great influence over the Tower itself, but less over the Players.
The departments will be mainly Personnel and Development.
"Personnel will handle Player-related affairs. Guild management, mediating disputes between Players."
"Fostering cooperation among Players? Promoting healthy competition?"
"Exactly. Competition itself isn't bad. The Tower has survived this long thanks to the ranking system, in my view. And you'll be in charge of Personnel."
"Me? First I'm hearing of it."
"Of course. I just told you now."
"Damn it all!"
Ber spat curses, sensing her workload ballooning.
I naturally ignored her and continued.
"But the most important task is something else."
"...What now?"
She asked with an ominous expression.
"We need to bring in talent from outside the Tower. Give them special privileges. Even people who haven't played the game—if they have talent, we can bring them in. Or fetch low-rankers earlier."
Time flows differently inside and outside the Tower.
Inside, it passes faster; outside, slower. That's why speed is key.
"Got it. So what's Development for?"
"They'll work on stabilizing the Tower's overly convoluted structure."
As I said before, the Tower has an abnormal setup.
Difficulty ramps up with floors, sure, but it's not intuitive.
The increases are erratic. We'll make them consistent.
"Group similar landscapes or themes to make conquering easier."
Plan is to bundle every 10 floors for consistency.
"What do we offer in return?"
"Haven't decided. Gotta figure out what balances it."
"Sigh, hold on."
Ber muttered a quiet curse but diligently pulled up data.
She gets foul-mouthed when working.
"How about this?"
"What?"
"Introduce bosses every 10 floors, ramp up difficulty over normal floors. Balances out, right?"
"Nice. Add floor movement restrictions too?"
"Movement restrictions?"
"Once you enter the 20s, no going back to the 10s. Block aid."
"So bigger rewards for beating bosses?"
"Yep. You get it."
"Then why are we doing this? Isn't this the Tower's job?"
Ber suddenly voiced her doubt.
"Took you long enough."
"Gotta handle work fast first. Now that there's a breather, I'm asking."
Fair enough, it was a lot.
"Plus, you broke into my place while I was sleeping and kidnapped me. Woke up half-dazed, and bam—urgent work. It was my day off in forever."
She gnashed her teeth fiercely.
"You'll ruin your teeth."
"Hah, if I couldn't even complain."
"Sorry."
The fury of an employee forced to work on a rest day was sharp. Technically, Ber was the boss.
She seemed to calm a bit as she shrank back mumbling.
"So why us?"
"Well..."
I had plenty to say too.
The Moon and Sun both sucked at their jobs. No wonder they got steamrolled by the Abyss.
They handled assigned tasks decently, but lacked creativity where it counted.
Too rigid, maybe?
We had no choice but to take over.
"Those two are working now, aren't they?"
"On what?"
"Managing so the worlds don't split."
More precisely, preventing the dimensions from separating.
Prepping so the original timeline and the rewound one don't divide into two dimensions.
"What happens if dimensions split?"
"No idea."
"What?"
"That's why we're being thorough. No clue what could happen."
We're managing it because we don't know the impact of separated dimensions.
Bad effects seem more likely than good.
"Not bummed?"
"About what?"
"All your collected books vanishing."
"What?"
"Huh?"
"Nah."
The Used Bookstore was set to rewind too.
"How?"
"Sorry, the rewind function's right under it."
I'd built it there on purpose.
"The books?"
"They move with it."
"Won't that cause issues? Records of futures that never happened?"
"Access restrictions will kick in. Regressors like us can read everything, but others get limited."
Even I was amazed at how many books I'd gathered. That's what made it possible.
Time has this quirky obsession with records.
"Maybe it doesn't recognize the rewind if records remain."
"Huh?"
"It might think it's looping back to the start, not resetting midway."
Not 1-2-3-4, 0, 1-2-3-4 with a break.
But 1-2-3-4-1-2-3-4, continuous.
History and records remaining make it seamless.
"Tricky. Hard to grasp."
"Don't try. Time's always capricious."
Maybe it's just overconfidence.
"Could be faith it'll follow the natural order anyway. Like an oracle—prophecy or not, the result's fixed."
The big picture stays the same, even if details shift.
Perhaps Time has us tangled in thorny vines, smirking crookedly.