"Even the most learned sages can scarcely grasp the truth of the Night World."
Hiltina spoke with careful precision.
"According to current mainstream understanding, the Night World is not a singular world. Rather, it is an aggregation of countless illusory realms… fragments left behind in history by civilizations long since vanished, echoes of the past that persist like residual memories."
Rast's blank expression betrayed no falseness, which seemed to prompt Hiltina to continue after a brief hesitation.
"Some scholars believe that the power sustaining the Night World may originate from one of the legendary primordial Pillars…"
"Those who wield the dominion of perpetual night, witnesses to all civilizations and histories, recorders of the past—they are called the Lords of Silence."
"Therefore, a select few who hold special credentials, able to freely enter and exit the Night World, call themselves Travelers in the Night."
"The worlds they enter are ephemeral echoes of history, fleeting fragments of memories that resurface at the moment eternal night falls."
Rast had already anticipated her next words.
"The Deep Blue Port we are currently in is one such historical echo aggregated within the Night World. In real history, Deep Blue Port had already been annihilated by a covert divine descent."
…
As he absorbed Hiltina's explanation, long-dormant memories surged within Rast's mind like a rising tide.
He was a transcender.
More precisely, Rast had recalled his previous life on the Blue Star over fifty thousand resets ago.
Armed with the memories and vision of a traveler from another world… for anyone else, this would be a godlike advantage.
For Rast, it was useless.
From the very first memories he retained, he had already been trapped in Deep Blue Port. No matter what he did in this port town, at dusk each day, the world reset to seven o'clock the previous evening.
Even after awakening to his past-life memories, nothing changed.
Time travel was indeed a powerful gift. A transcender could profit from literature of the past, exploit marketable ideas, or leverage superior insight to advance technology, push civilizations forward, and be revered by all as a saint.
But all of this required time.
Even in the butterfly effect, a butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon would take days to stir a storm across the ocean.
Rast had less than a day.
In this brief time, he appeared omnipotent, yet could do nothing—leave nothing behind.
And simply raising one's social status, becoming a saint admired by all, gaining power, wealth, beauty…
These were things Rast could have accomplished in Deep Blue Port even without past-life memories. After tens of thousands of cycles, he was utterly bored with it all.
Yet now, with Hiltina's appearance, a glimmer of change arose.
"Night World."
The words resonated with something buried deep within him.
Rast recalled fragments of his previous life. Before this rebirth, he had been a developer on a fantasy game called Snowmoon Emblem.
The Night World was intended as the paid DLC, Shadows of the Past, launched alongside the main game.
In the design, it was like a dungeon hub—players could continue exploring after finishing the main story, grinding, completing challenges, or extending playtime. Multiplayer features were also designed to function there. Even the multiplayer itself could be monetized separately. A clever plan, but Rast had never seen it go live. Before he could witness his creation, he had been reborn in another world the night before the closed beta.
Because he had been a lowly programmer, not responsible for story or art, he only had vague impressions of the game's plot outside his contributions.
But those fragments, combined with Hiltina's explanation, were enough for him to understand his situation.
Lost civilizations reappeared at nightfall, fragments of memories—so-called echoes of the past, or as he might call them from his previous life, a game dungeon capable of infinite resets.
This was the truth that had trapped Rast for centuries: Deep Blue Port.
…
These reflections passed quickly.
Rast spoke again.
"So when you mentioned the higher-tier sequences earlier…"
"And the Tower, the Shadows… those are special abilities possessed by Night Travelers who can freely access the Night World?"
Hiltina nodded.
"Exactly. To be precise, only those who ascend to the higher sequences are granted entry to the Night World. Currently, seventeen sequences are known. For instance, she belonged to the Shadow Sequence as a Dancer, having reached its third tier. Some even call this tier the Mind Demon."
Hiltina crouched, lifting the cracked black iron mask from the corpse.
"If I'm not mistaken, she belongs to a secret faction hostile to me in the real world. She used special tools to track me and followed me into the Night World."
"The Shadow Sequence is especially effective against me. Had it not been for my own retaliatory ability, this would have been a grueling battle."
After examining the masked woman's corpse, Hiltina stood.
"The ability you manifested—capable of turning a Dancer's Word powers back on her—is an extremely rare higher sequence. The Tower: the Lantern Bearer."
Hiltina gazed at Rast.
"I originally thought you were a historical projection of the Night World, a native echo from the past."
"But it seems I was mistaken."
Rules hidden within the Night World ensured that any external Night Traveler revealing information to historical echoes would be severely punished.
Yet Hiltina had suffered no backlash.
"You are not a mere echo of the past within the Night World."
"You are… a genuine human being."