I re-checked the NTR ending, and both Aywin and Celis are shown happy with their babies in the end. There’s no sadness, no sense of worry for Noah—not even a single word of hope that he might be safe somewhere. This is pure hentai-logic NTR, where all the feelings are just erased. Celis was already gone for me the moment she started fucking with Eydir like a rabbit, even when she wasn’t forced to, and especially after Noah had confessed his feelings to her. That should have cleared her insecurities, but instead she gave in—and even went so far as to ask Eydir for sex herself at times. For me, she was far past redemption, and the problem is that there’s no clear “intermediate step” that explains the drastic shift toward the "happy ending", something I’ve already mentioned several times in this thread.
Story-wise, this game is fantastic. But the girls don’t really act like they care about the MC—instead, they just want him gone so they can give in completely without remembering him. It comes across as selfish, because nothing actually stopped them from leaving the village with him. The fact they chose to stay with the murderer of her husband, and with the man who wants her son dead, says everything. That’s why I’ve always felt that in the True Ending, Noah should have written down everything he went through after being abandoned by Celis and even by his own mother, so that she’d feel the weight of her actions and regret them. She should have been forced to face what she did—sleeping with her husband’s murderer and trusting her own nephew, who tried to kill Noah multiple times.
On top of that, I really wish Celis would learn the truth—that she gave her virginity to Eydir based on a lie. He told her he had saved Noah, when in reality Noah was rescued by a high elf woman.
Well despite this, I loved this game and I was happy N_taii gave me the opportunity to test it and review HC3 on Steam. I hope more people will discover the game and enjoy it!