Epilogue and Prologue

When time is turned back in the Tower, many things will change. Though I’m not sure if those changes can create a meaningful difference.

First of all, the relationship between the Tower and the Abyss will change.

The Abyss will still try to see the end of the world, and the Tower will try to maintain it.

It’s a difference in perspective and a difference in belief.

The Abyss thinks it’s right to completely end the world and start anew.

On the other hand, the Tower wants to maintain the world created by its god.

The former is easier in terms of difficulty.

Sometimes it’s better to destroy and rebuild than to repair when there’s too much to fix.

In reality, the former succeeded, and the latter failed. Because that’s the current situation.

Come to think of it, it seemed the Abyss gave a chance.

It could be seen as giving one more chance, hoping that it was wrong.

After all, the Tower didn’t develop anything from the initial system.

Only some of the NPCs will experience regression together.

If you have a title or nickname representing yourself, like Ber, your qualifications are sufficient.

It’s a judgment that one has obtained a sort of status, albeit a slight one.

Without status, one cannot withstand regression itself, so it can’t be helped.

“But that way, won’t the future inevitably be distorted?”

“Why?”

“Well, we’re not losing our memories or our powers. If we actively intervene, it seems like the future will inevitably be distorted.”

I shook my head at Ber’s words.

“We won’t be able to actively intervene. Our intervention is only allowed at the very beginning.”

The only time we can make a meaningful change after regression is at the beginning.

Even that was a result obtained by putting forth conditions such as the revocation of the Sun’s administrator position, along with the authority I originally received.

After that, we cannot touch the system within the Tower.

“The more people experience regression, the stronger the elasticity of time will be.”

Originally, if 1 unit of energy was needed to create 1, after regression, we would need to invest 10 units of energy to create 1.

At the beginning, that energy restriction is temporarily lifted.

“So it’s not always good to go back too far.”

“But if it’s too little, it won’t be able to withstand the elasticity of time itself. You’ll probably forget the memories quickly too.”

“That’s difficult. It’s also a scary story.”

Ber lets out a groan while grabbing her forehead from the side.

I can see dark circles extending below her eyes.

“Ugh, why is this so difficult?”

“I told you it was difficult.”

“My eyes feel like they’re going to fall out.”

Stretching her words, she also stretches herself and melts onto the desk.

“It’s nothing compared to the work you do.”

I don’t understand what she’s saying when she runs shops almost at the level of a major corporation.

“That’s different from this. I’m pretty good with numbers.”

“Shut up and drink your coffee.”

I placed a cup of coffee in front of Ber, who was whining. She must be weak to sleep. Seeing her act like a child like this.

“So how are you going to use the opportunity you obtained?”

She asks, not even lifting her face, just wiggling her arms.

“I’m going to add the concept of Constellations to the existing system.”

“Constellations? The ones that only appear in novels?”

Curious at the mention of Constellations, she just lifts her head and looks at me.

“It’s a kind of workaround. This way, we can continuously exert influence.”

It’s not even creating a new function that didn’t exist. It’s just expanding an existing function.

Plus, since it’s impossible to give rewards for free, the balance is somewhat maintained. Because you need to pay a price to provide a reward.

Completely unreasonable support is impossible.

If we assume there’s a process and a result, time only enforces the result.

We need to twist the process as much as possible to make it deviate from the original result.

“Our job is to turn a butterfly’s flap into a storm.”

“Wow, that sounds difficult.”

She answers with a deflated exclamation.

It might look easy because of the term “butterfly effect,” but if you try to calculate everything, your brain will explode.

“That’s why we need to start a lot of things. We don’t give time to clean up. If we push hard like that, small cracks will form, and we’ll gradually move away from the original future.”

“Easier said than done.”

“At least the words should be easy. Brainwash yourself. That’s the only way it’ll be manageable.”

Ber’s face distorts slightly.

“Haa, so we create Constellations. Is that it?”

“No, I’m going to create departments within the Tower.”

It’s a concept similar but different from Constellations.

It has more influence on the Tower itself but less influence on players.

The department will be largely divided into the Human Resources Department and the Development Department.

“The Human Resources Department will handle tasks related to players. It will be in charge of guild-related tasks or mediation of disputes between players.”

“Are you trying to create an atmosphere of cooperation among players? Are you pursuing healthy competition and such?”

“That’s right. Competition itself isn’t a bad thing. I think the Tower has been able to maintain itself so far thanks to the competitive system called ranking. And you’ll be in charge of the Human Resources Department.”

“Me? This is the first I’m hearing of this.”

“Of course. I just told you today.”

“$@#$#@%”

Ber, sensing that her work would increase, spouts profanity.

Naturally ignoring it, I continued.

“But the most important task is something else.”

“…What now?”

She asks with an expression suggesting something ominous.

“We need to bring in talent from outside the Tower. I’m going to give them special authority. People who haven’t played the game can be brought in if they have talent. Or bringing them into the Tower earlier even if their ranking is low.”

There’s a time difference between inside and outside the Tower.

Time flows faster inside the Tower and slower outside. That’s why it’s important to bring them in as quickly as possible.

“I understand that. What does the Development Department do?”

“It will work on making the currently complicated Tower more stable.”

As I mentioned before, the Tower has an abnormal structure.

It’s true that the difficulty increases as you climb the floors, but it’s not intuitive.

The rate of difficulty increase was irregular. I plan to maintain that rate consistently.

“I’m thinking of grouping similar landscapes or themes to make conquering easier.”

The plan is to group them in units of 10 floors to increase consistency.

“What do we have to give up from our side for that?”

“It hasn’t been decided yet. Which one should we give up to roughly maintain balance?”

“Haah, let me think.”

Ber, while quietly swearing, diligently searched for the data.

She tends to get crude when working.

“I think this would work?”

“What is it?”

“We’ll introduce bosses in units of 10 floors to increase the difficulty more than regular floors. Wouldn’t that roughly maintain balance?”

“That’s good. Plus, I think it would be good to set movement restrictions by floor.”

“Movement restrictions?”

“When you enter the 20s floor range, you can’t move to the 10s floor range. We’re blocking them from giving help.”

“Then do we give bigger rewards for defeating bosses?”

“That’s right. As expected, we communicate well.”

“But why are we doing this work? This is originally the Tower’s job, isn’t it?”

Ber suddenly seemed to have a question and asked so.

“You’re asking quite quickly.”

“First of all, the work should be done quickly. Now that I have some leisure, I’m asking.”

Well, there was quite a lot of work.

“Plus, someone was sleeping, and you invaded and kidnapped me. Waking up from sleep in a half-awake state, and then suddenly telling me it’s urgent and making me work. It was a rare holiday.”

She speaks, grinding her teeth frighteningly.

“You’ll ruin your teeth doing that.”

“Ha, I can’t even speak now.”

“I’m sorry.”

The anger of an office worker forced to come to work on a rest day was fierce. Ber would be a CEO if we were to specify.

However, as I spoke, crouching down significantly, her anger seemed to subside a bit.

“So why do we have to do it?”

“So…”

I had a lot to say too.

Both the Moon and the Sun were terrible at the job. Well, that’s why they were easily pushed back by the Abyss.

They do the given tasks quite well, but they showed deficiencies in tasks requiring creativity.

Is it because they’re both too straight-laced?

I had no choice but to take on the work.

“I think they’re working on something too right now.”

“What kind of work?”

“They need to manage so that the world doesn’t separate.”

More precisely, it’s managing so that dimensions don’t separate.

They’re doing preparatory work to ensure that the original timeline and the time-reversed timeline don’t split into two dimensions.

“What happens if dimensions separate?”

“I don’t know.”

“What?”

“That’s why we’re being more thorough. Because we don’t know what will happen.”

We manage it because we don’t know what effect the separated dimensions will have.

Because the possibility of negative effects is greater than positive effects.

“Aren’t you regretful?”

“About what?”

“All the books you’ve collected will disappear too.”

“What?”

“Huh?”

“That’s not true.”

The used bookstore was also scheduled to go back.

“How is that possible?”

“Sorry, but the function to turn back the past is beneath here.”

When building the used bookstore, I deliberately built it on top of that.

“What about the books?”

“The books will move together.”

“Wouldn’t that be a problem? They contain records of future events that haven’t happened yet.”

“Browsing restrictions will be in place. Returnees like us can browse all books, but others will be restricted.”

Even I think I’ve collected quite a lot of books. That’s why it was possible.

Time, funnily enough, tends to be obsessed with records and such.

“Maybe it doesn’t think of it as turning back time if records remain.”

“Huh?”

“It seems to think of it as going back to the beginning rather than being reset and cut off in the middle.”

1-2-3-4, 0, 1-2-3-4. It doesn’t break like this.

1-2-3-4-1-2-3-4. It thinks it continues like this.

Because if history or records remain, it can continue in that way.

“This is difficult. Hard to understand.”

“Don’t try to understand. Time is inherently capricious.”

Perhaps it’s just simple confidence.

“It might be confidence that things will eventually return to the natural order even after doing all this. It’s confidence that whether you hear the prophecy like an oracle or not, the result will flow as determined.”

It’s an expression of confidence that while the minor branches might change, the major branches won’t change.

Perhaps time, like thorny vines, is binding us tightly and smiling crookedly.