After Mario’s adventure segnt ended, it beca Link’s rescue-the-princess adventure.
"Wow, it’s The Legend of Zelda!"
"The Legend of Zelda? Is that person Zelda?"
"Tch—one look and I can tell you’re clueless. That’s not Zelda. That’s Link!"
"??? Link? Then why is it called The Legend of Zelda?"
"Because Zelda is the princess."
"Can you play as the princess in this ga?"
"Uh... no. In this ga you can only play as Link. You can’t play the other characters."
"Now I’m even more confused. If the protagonist is Link, why isn’t it called The Legend of Link? Why is it called The Legend of Zelda instead?"
That had to be a century-long mystery.
Countless people were baffled by why the ga was called The Legend of Zelda.
Hardcore fans would defend the series and offer all kinds of explanations.
But none of those explanations were official—they carried no real authority.
Soone once interviewed Takayuki and asked why it was called The Legend of Zelda instead of The Legend of Link. Takayuki only replied that it was his personal preference, with no special reason.
That answer counted as "official," but it obviously didn’t satisfy the player base.
Could a ga’s title really be decided just because of "personal preference"?
No way they’d believe that!
They were more willing to accept other players’ analyses that sounded more reasonable.
Eventually, soone even founded a "Zelda Studies Research Society," focusing on researching the series’ stories—and especially researching why The Legend of Zelda was called The Legend of Zelda.
As for Takayuki’s explanation, their response was: Takayuki was just a ga creator—he didn’t understand the true core of Zelda at all. So they promptly "revoked his Zelda citizenship" and chose to believe only their own explanations.
Takayuki had just one word for behavior like that: bored.
Though to be fair, he used to be pretty bored too.
In his previous life, besides "Nintendo Studies," there were also "Kojima Studies," "Souls Studies," and all sorts of bizarre groups that could form seminars out of thin air.
To study hidden lore in Dark Souls, countless people burned through who knew how many brain cells.
There were also groups dedicated to studying Hideo Kojima—whether the gas he made contained deeper anings.
Even when Kojima himself ca out to explain certain things, many players still refused to believe him, and it beca a running .
Takayuki hadn’t expected to receive the sa kind of "treatnt" in this world.
At the Olympic opening ceremony, Link was searching through clusters of mysterious jungles and caves in the arena, looking for sothing. At last, he seed to find a treasure chest.
He opened it, revealing a small fla inside.
The fla burned in the perforr’s hands as if it would never go out.
Then the Link perforr walked to the very center of the venue, where a gigantic torch had appeared.
Surrounding the huge torch were smaller torches.
Link placed the fla he had obtained onto one of the smaller torches, making it burn steadily.
At the sa ti, a beam of light on the ground stretched perfectly straight toward the end of the field, reaching the spectator stands.
Seats along that straight-line path lit up one after another. The light finally converged on the stadium roof, sparkling like stars.
"Is this... lighting up a path of light?"
Earlier, Mario had opened a route so that Link could find the chest.
Once Link’s chest segnt ended, the chanical stage terrain began moving again. A few minutes later, a castle-like scene erged.
At the castle gates stood a knight wearing a helt.
"Sun Knight! Praise the Sun!"
A small group in the crowd jumped up in excitent and raised their hands high.
Seeing that, Takayuki felt it was strangely familiar.
In Dark Souls there was a Sun Knight, and Suri Electronics had also created its own Sun Knight.
Originally they belonged to two different worlds, yet sohow they ford an unspoken resonance—creating very similar Sun Knight imagery.
On the stage, the Sun Knight raised both hands. A ray of light shone down on him. Then the castle gates opened, and a dragon—projected as a hologram—appeared before the knight.
The dragon’s oppressive presence was intense. It spewed violent flas. The actor playing the Sun Knight remained calm, holding a longsword as he was lifted into the air on wires, then drove the blade into the holographic dragon’s forehead—
And a burst of light exploded at the center of the arena.
"Has holographic projection technology already beco this mature?" Takayuki exclaid in surprise as he watched the performance below.
This world’s pace of developnt was several years ahead of his original world. Even holographic projection technology had beco fully realized—it no longer relied on a screen or curtain to barely fake the effect. Now it could genuinely place a lifelike hologram into real space.
But achieving this wasn’t cheap. If Gastar Electronic Entertainnt hadn’t been wealthy enough to provide Ono Sa with massive technical and financial support, he likely wouldn’t even have had the chance to use such advanced technology.
In fact, this holographic projection was still at a laboratory stage in this world. Just those few dozen seconds of the dragon scene cost over a million dollars—more expensive than CGI.
If it weren’t to imrse the live audience, Ono Sa wouldn’t have wanted to burn money like this.
"Didn’t expect you to be impressed by sothing like this," Aya said beside him, holding little Yu. "Then the hologram tech really is impressive. Do you want to develop gas using it later?"
Yu—like a cute porcelain doll—had eyes sparkling with light, reaching out as if trying to grab the distant, unreal-looking hologram, but of course it was futile.
Hearing Aya, Takayuki’s mind suddenly sparked. "We really could make a holographic projection ga. But the cost is still a bit high right now. We can wait until the technology matures."
In his mind, a rough blueprint for holographic-projection gas had already ford.
In his original world, there were no true hologram gas.
But VR technology in that world was quite mature. He could transplant classic VR gaplay ideas into holographic projection, making the holograms feel even more real.
Below, after the holographic dragon was defeated, a small fla appeared in the Sun Knight’s hand. The perforr carried the burning fla to the central torch and lit another small torch beside it.
Then, as before, a beam of light extended from the ground into the stands, illuminating seats along its path, and finally forming another glowing point on the stadium roof.
At that mont, everyone understood.
Next, each character would appear in turn, each collecting fire in their own way.
It was like playing a ga.
No wonder this was an opening ceremony led by Gastar Electronic Entertainnt.
But in truth, this idea hadn’t co from Takayuki or anyone inside Gastar.
It had been conceived entirely by Ono Sa—the seventy-plus-year-old director himself.
Ever since he was young, he had loved chasing trends.
When video gas rose, he had been hooked for a ti.
Later he also had various ties to gas, even serving as a supervising producer for so ga adaptations.
He could be considered quite familiar with video gas, able to evaluate them from a player’s perspective—and to co up with great ga-inspired ideas.
This ti, he wanted to emulate the polished experience of Gastar Park.
In Gastar Park, visitors didn’t rely stroll around and ride roller coasters like in a normal the park. Instead, every visitor was given "missions" and gaplay-like objectives, motivating them to complete tasks and experience the joy of "playing a video ga" in real life.
Now Ono Sa was treating the Olympic opening ceremony itself as a video ga.
Even the audience in the stands could feel deeply involved.
Those sweeping beams of light made it feel as if the spectators were actively participating, experiencing the thrill of "play."
So people even felt jealous of those seated in the illuminated paths.
Those lucky bastards—paying the sa ticket price, yet enjoying an experience beyond the ticket’s value.
This concept had been kept completely secret. Everyone had signed NDAs, and any breach ant enormous fines, so no one dared leak the opening ceremony content. Ono Sa wanted everything to remain mysterious.
When the truth was revealed, everyone would suddenly understand: so that’s what it was—how did I not realize earlier?
Link and the Sun Knight had completed their missions, but they didn’t leave the stage. Each stood quietly before the torch they had lit, waiting for what ca next.
As for Mario—because he was the Pri Minister—he couldn’t realistically participate through the entire ceremony. So he was removed from the sequence, leaving only Luigi to continue the tasks.
After that, an image from a classic Japanese ani appeared.
Takayuki didn’t recognize it—it was a classic icon of this world. So people in the stadium shouted excitedly the mont they saw it, just as gars did when they saw familiar characters.
Earlier, so had questioned whether Gastar’s involvent would turn the opening ceremony into a solo show for video gas, making the Olympics a promotional tool for gaming.
But Gastar wasn’t that narrow-minded, and Ono Sa was too proud to do sothing that would tarnish the ceremony’s image.
He had his own backbone. If he had to beco Gastar’s marketing tool, he would never have agreed.
So ani and traditional Japanese culture also held important places in the ceremony.
Out of personal taste, he leaned the focus slightly toward video gas—but only slightly, and never more.
Ani icons and traditional cultural symbols continued appearing in the performance.
At the center of the stadium were twenty-one small torches arranged around the giant torch.
The Legend of Zelda, the Sun Knight, troid, Suri Electronics’ 3D racing, a cha from an ani resembling Gundam, a sumo wrestler from traditional Japanese culture—
Everything was represented, each highly iconic.
In total, there were twenty-one figures.
Video ga icons occupied nine slots, ani occupied seven, and traditional Japanese culture only five.
Mainly because Japan was rather small.
There were only so many things that the general public had a shared image of. Show too much and it wouldn’t work, because so "traditions" were essentially copied from ancient continental cultures—pulling them out now would be embarrassing.
But ninjas, sumo, haiku, and the like had evolved over ti into distinctly Japanese elents—those were safe to display.
Satisfied.
At least, the audience was satisfied.
They didn’t care whether "traditional culture" had fewer slots. They only cared about seeing what they loved.
And who dared claim that video gas and ani weren’t part of Japan’s "tradition" now?
If you really wanted to be strict, everything shown in the opening ceremony could be considered part of Japan’s modern tradition.
Finally, all twenty-one small torches ignited, and twenty-one beams of light projected onto the stadium roof. Using those twenty-one points as anchors, they ford a complex star pattern overhead.
Then a man descended from the sky.
He was a national-treasure-level Japanese actor—soone even the Pri Minister deeply respected.
Takayuki also had so impression of him, though he had never had any contact.
He had been chosen as the final torchbearer partly because of his status, and partly because he was Ono Sa’s close friend. During preparations, Ono Sa had slipped in a bit of personal preference, letting familiar friends participate in the ceremony.
No one objected. Everyone felt it was perfectly normal.
The actor’s stature was more than sufficient—there was nothing wrong with him being the final torchbearer.
He descended from above, flew on wires for a while, and then arrived before the massive central torch.
At this mont, the twenty-one figures representing different cultures all turned to look toward the national-treasure actor.
He radiated presence. Holding the torch, he walked step by step toward the giant fla.
Yet his hand trembled slightly.
Even as a national-treasure actor, he had never seen a scene like this.
To have this one chance in his life—to light the Olympic fla—ant he would have no regrets.
Then, as if making up his mind, he raised the torch toward the enormous central brazier.
Boom!
The torch ignited. Above the stadium, the twenty-one "star lights" burst into dazzling fireworks.
Music swelled—a lody woven from video gas, ani, and traditional culture.
The Olympics had begun.
And in the hearts of every spectator in the stadium, and everyone watching the live broadcast, they all agreed:
This was the best opening ceremony they had ever seen—utterly unique, different from anything before, and perfectly in step with the tis.
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