"Autumn~Rain of Love~" was the name of this game. As a new work released two years ago, the plot mode of the game was no longer limited to 'options', but was dominated by the Level of Affection of NPCs.
Using Shen Qing's words to describe it, it would be, "It doesn't matter whether the option is right or wrong, as long as the AI's level of affection towards you is off the chart, you can also conquer her."
The game was localized, so the name of the protagonist of the game did not have any restrictions, so I did not hesitate to use my real name.
I didn't like to spend time designing my character. In terms of appearance, I chose to use my real appearance. I needed to explain first that this had nothing to do with narcissism. Even if it was a dating simulation game, I didn't want the characters in it to face a player who was completely made up from start to finish. Maybe this was also because of Ying's influence on me. After all, after leaving the game, she also recognized and accepted the real me without difficulty...
After entering the game, what appeared in front of me was a high school-like building.
Bailu High School-
'Is this the school's name?'
Oh right, this was a small seaside city called Bailu City. However, from the map, this city actually did not qualify to be called a seaside city. It was said to be a small seaside city, but it was actually a half-hour drive from the sea.
After all, the simulation of sea tides and currents was very time-consuming and expensive. It involved a lot of fluid dynamics calculations, which was not necessary for a galgame with limited cost.
——As mentioned in the game introduction, in front of me was the best high school in this small city, located on Zhuxi Road.
As for the game background, it was around 2025. The artificial intelligence technology of this era was not as perfect as in reality. It mainly focused on the recognition of images and sounds. Smart Companions had not yet become popular.
Opposite the school gate was a flower bed with a fountain in the middle. On the front and on both sides were the teaching building and laboratories, it was the standard school structure.
At this time, it was the first day of school. A large number of students dressed in their daily clothes gathered in front of an exhibition board-like thing at the school gate. Saying that it looked like an exhibition board, because it was different from the ordinary exhibition board. It did not have a display screen. The displayed content was printed on paper and pasted on the board in a very primitive way for everyone to read.
When I got closer, I saw the words on the paper clearly read- "Class Arrangement".
Squeezing further into the crowd, I finally found my name from many papers-it was in the form of High School First Year, Class 2.
But at this moment, I saw a slender finger sliding on the form, seemingly looking for her name.
It slid all the way down from the first name, and then it slid above my name.
I looked at the owner of the finger. It was a girl with long orange hair. The white hairpin added a touch of scholarly elegance to her.
Because of her fair skin, the orange colour of her hair didn't look so strange. Speaking of which...a certain female character in the previous game also had this hair color.
While I was looking at her, she suddenly turned her head and saw me.
She looked at me stunned for a full minute. I was also looking at her.
"Are you... Shi Yuanxing?"
After a long time, she finally plucked up the courage, but still said my name with a hint of hesitation.
"Mhm, who are you?"
I had some idea about who she might be, but I still pretended that I didn't know and asked. After the experience in the previous game, I was less afraid to communicate with girls. But it was only limited to the girls in games.
"Eh... How can you not remember who I am? We used to play house together when we were young, and play water guns."
Play House seemed to be a game similar to a real role-playing game. Although it was a childhood game of my grandma's generation, this game was not suitable for boys to play… What exactly was my setting in the game?
"Ah— it's you, long time no see."
I scratched my head, pretending to remember something.
As soon as my voice fell, floating words suddenly appeared on her head,
[Lin Liyu - Childhood Sweetheart]
Was it really her, one of the heroines of this game?
She smiled slightly.
"What a coincidence, we were actually in the same class. Since we separated, it has been so many years..."
She stopped suddenly. She didn't seem to want to continue this topic.
Of course, based on my years of gaming experience, this must be some kind of foreshadowing.
"Yes."
I just nodded-although she was also a beautiful girl, I already had Ying, so I shouldn't get any funny ideas about her.
"A rare reunion, let's report to the class together!"
When she finished speaking, the world before her suddenly darkened.
[End of Prologue]
A popup floated in front of me. Was it just a prologue? I reunited with my childhood sweetheart, whom I hadn't seen for many years on the first day of school. Seemed like an interesting start. Now I was actually looking forward to what would happen next.
However--
[One year later, High School Second Year, Class 2]
What? Suddenly a year later? What the hell was this?
The image lit up again, and I found myself sitting in the bottom row in the middle of an ordinary classroom. There were kinds of high school teenagers and girls in school uniforms around me. They sat in their seats obediently and listened to the teacher.
...This was the campus atmosphere I was familiar with! Compared with the previous work that took place in Japan in the early 21st century, I was obviously much more familiar with this scene.
"Today's morning self-study content is..."
The speaker was an ordinary middle-aged man who was slightly bald. Words like his [name] and [class teacher, math teacher] were floating above his head. This function was really convenient... it could quickly help players familiarize themselves with this environment and play their role well.
"Then let the class representative lead everyone to read early."
As soon as the voice fell, the girl sitting on my left hand stood up.
Seeing me looking at her in confusion, she smiled at me.
So Lin Liyu was my tablemate? Thinking about the prologue again, I guessed that she was the main heroine of this game. After all, only she and the teacher had [names] on their heads. Having a name meant that they were not random NPCs.
Speaking of which, Shen Qing and Ying should also be in the game... Although this was a single-player game, I really couldn't imagine how they would exist in the game- I unconsciously thought of the last game in which Shen Qing was Meow Chan... If she still did this, then I might have a way to get back at her for mocking me.
"Yuan~"
...
I saw a girl with her orange hair braided into two ponytails tied smiling at me on the other side of my seat, and her appearance was very familiar. Talking in this tone and calling me this way... it could only be Ying, although her hair color and pupil color were slightly different, her tone and look still maintained her unique characteristic.
"Why did Yuan just come here? This school is different from the school I attended before. I have a lot of questions that I want to ask you."
Of course, it was not the same. The countries and backgrounds of the two schools were different.
But the language aspect was not a problem. One advantage of Ying as a program was that she did not need to learn a language. If she needed to learn any language, she just needed to add the corresponding translation program.
"Speaking of which, have you seen Shen Qing?"
I was very worried that Shen Qing would choose to escape because she hated me, and did not enter the game at all. But then that would probably be much better for me, I would not have problems doing it alone.
"That annoying cat is over there."
Ying also made no secret of her dislike for Shen Qing. The relationship between these two people seemed a bit inharmonious...
The slender girl with long black hair sitting in front of Ying was calmly looking out the window. This strangers-stay-away look was exactly the same as the iceberg beauty in the college.
Taking advantage of the five-minute rest at the end of the morning self-study, I walked to Shen Qing.
"Shen Qing, how did you get into the game..."
"It was the programmer who modified the game and let us replace the npcs in the game."
She gave the answer before I finished the question.
"You can even do this?"
The organization's "programmer" was a really mysterious person, and he could even change the game code at will like this. That kind of code would only give me a headache when I looked at it. If the "programmer" did it alone, then he was definitely not an ordinary person...
"But Ying is not a human being. She can also enter the game like this?"
"Anyway, she has self-awareness and can exist as a player. Compared to me, solving her replacement part is much easier."
I looked at Ying who was curiously observing the surroundings.
"By the way, don't talk to me and Ying often, if it alarms Awakened AI, then it is over."
If it was an Awakened AI with self-awareness, it may also have memories of the previous reincarnation. Having bizarre plot deviation, it would definitely make it aware of something. Of course, we were not very afraid that AI could infer our mission, but it was better to be careful.
There was no doubt that there was Awakened AI in the game. Judging from the previous analysis of the boss, there was a high possibility that it was one of the main heroines in the game that needed to be conquered, and there was such a person in the class now...
"--Wait, since you replaced these NPCs? Wouldn't you be discovered from the beginning?"
"Eh... you think the programmers doesn't not know such a simple problem? Only you can see that our appearances look almost the same as in reality. No matter how powerful an Awakened AI is, it can't escape the limitations of the game system. They can't see the labels on the characters. It's impossible for them to have the same permissions as the players. In other people's eyes, Ying is still the straight-A student Setsuna with glasses, and I'm Kazusa who is late every day and likes to sleep in the class.
I couldn't help but sigh once again that the programmer really had an amazing skill...
"It turns out that we can even do this... Is this your name in the game? It feels weird..."
"This is specially set to pay tribute to a well-known galgame released a long time ago. That game has been talked about for a long time. It is a legendary game..."
"Legendary game? What's the name of the game? I'll try it if I have time."
After all, it was a game that she who was a hardcore gaming otaku admire deeply, so it must be a good game.
"I don't know... I don't even know its name. It is not the galgame on the VR platform but on the PC platform with the front-end display. It was released a long time ago. I don't know what happened. In short, this work has become a craze on the Internet. As time passed, there were no records related to it on the Internet, as if someone completely removed it..."
Shen Qing… she shouldn't be called Kazusa here, showed a little regretful expression.
"That's why it's called the legendary galgame..."
"The only thing that is left of this game is the names and basic settings of the two heroines. It naturally has no copyright issues if all the information is unknown. The production company may have already closed down. To express respect for this work, many galgame developers introduce these two characters into their games as well..."
Was "Autumn~Rain of Love~" one of them...It sounded a little sad, looking at Kazusa's regretful face, I seemed to have discovered the New World. It turned out that Shen Qing would show this expression...
"Forget it, the class is about to begin, go back." Then my first class in the game began. As a college student, although I missed high school life, what I missed was not the classes.