Phaser stared at the writing as Haruno finished her last translation. His hand brushed the wall, tracing the faint strokes of dried blood and carved words.
"If they die in this loop, they might not remember. That's why she... I kept writing. Every version of me forgot everything when she died. The notes are a failsafe to remember what's forgotten."
Phaser didn't expect to end up in this situation. If anything, getting the Blood Odachi is completely different than what he initially thought.
"That means this cave isn't just a location. It's a save point."
"Save point?"
"In the game sense. If this is a trial meant to test your endurance through repetition, then the trial must preserve the structure of each attempt and not your memories. Meaning, the cave doesn't reset, but you do. The writings remain, the bones remain, the results remain but your awareness gets overwritten each time you die."
He turned back to the wall, studying the countless variations of her handwriting.
"And that's why every account on these walls starts from the same moment. The Japanese village, the Odachi, the escape, the worm and suicide or death from the blade. Each Haruno is born into the same loop, unaware of the last."
"But you're here this time. You weren't in any of these. Why? And please explain it to me in a way I'll understand, maybe start from the beginning."
"That's what I've been thinking about. You said this trial is connected to MoDS, right? The world mirrors its logic."
She nodded slowly.
"Then let's use that logic. In MoDS, every major arc had multiple routes, like branching paths that split depending on player choices. The same event can happen in dozens of variations. But not all routes are equal. Some are locked until certain conditions are met like affection levels, certain deaths, or cleared quests."
He crouched down beside one of the older skeletons, brushing the frost off its skull.
"So what if all these versions of you, all 173 of them, were the previous 'routes' of the Blood Odachi storyline? And each one followed the original progression of the game. Meaning you went to the Japanese village during the Third Dominia Quest, not now."
Haruno blinked. "But... we're only in the first."
"Exactly. Which means this version of events shouldn't exist yet. We took a future storyline and forced it to trigger now. In other words, we broke the game."
She took a hesitant step closer.
"That's... impossible. And crazy."
"Maybe in the real world. But we re in a reality governed by rules and the Masquerade System. If the trial was meant to be in the future, then what we're experiencing isn't just a loop. It's a dislocated timeline or a premature trigger of a future event."
Haruno looked at the desperate, bloody scrawls counting days and cycles and the repetition of the same despairing end.
"So the 173 Harunos were from the future versions of this trial.. and we're the first ones to enter it early?"
"By theory, yes. Which means the system or whatever force governs this trial had to pull us forward to the point where the Blood Odachi exists. Because if it didn't, you'd be in an incomplete world where the Odachi hasn't even been created yet. So it shifted us here to the time when it already exists."
She frowned, her breath trembling.
"You're saying... time travel?"
"In a sense, theoretically. The trial likely constructed a pseudo-future based on the Odachi's canonical timeline. We're in a fabricated timeline where the prerequisites of the Third Dominia Quest already exist."
He began pacing as he continued, his tone slipping into deep focus.
"This also explains why I'm here and not in the previous routes. In all the other 173 cycles, you came alone because the game dictated it that way. But now, this isn't a game route. It's the real world adapting the route logic since the Outers came. Meaning the presence of another variable like me created a new branch."
Haruno tilted her head.
"A 174th cycle. Then... if this is a new route, does that mean everything here is still adapting to us?"
"Most likely. That's why some things don't add up. The fresh bones are adapting to the current cycle. The worm is meant to ensure failure if you break progression order. It's trying to maintain the game's narrative integrity even when we've violated it."
"So this whole place is the world trying to correct us."
"The trial is improvising because you're supposed to obtain the Blood Odachi. That's your fixed destiny. But you're not supposed to get it yet. So to preserve the narrative, the world is recycling the failed versions of you into the current timeline. Every Haruno you see written here is a paradox correction. The system is attempting to achieve a destined outcome under broken parameters, hence why you're reviving. But the real question is why it allows me to exist in this version."
Haruno tilted her head. "Because... you're a variable?"
"More than that, but I don't know why."
Phaser remembered how he got Neveolus. He died in the Chronological Temple and revived. The palace is directly linked to the God of Chronology. When he killed himself to forge the connection, time stopped for him. When he came back, he remembered he could feel the way time bends. That's why this did not feel foreign to him. Every time he shifted the time flow within the Palace, he sensed ripples when he did so. And now, he felt the same ripples here.
"This means this timeline isn't just reacting to you. It's reacting to me too."
"So your existence stabilized the broken route?"
"Or caused it. Either way, we're standing in a paradox that shouldn't exist and that's exactly why the we aren't charged out yet."
"And if we die here again..?"
"Then we reset but maybe not in the same timeline. Maybe in the next loop, we won't remember this conversation. Or worse, maybe the next Haruno will wake up alone again, with no trace of me, thinking she's the first."
Haruno clenched her fists. "Then that's why they wrote everything down..."
"They did so leave a record for you so that even if your mind resets, you might get out of it."
Haruno glanced at the nearest wall, where her own handwriting trailed off into jagged red scrawls:
"I saw her again. She looked like me. She was me."
"And that's where the horror begins."
She turned toward him. "Why?"
"Because if all of this is a loop and we're standing in the 174th iteration, then somewhere in this cave, maybe the 175th is already beginning."