How does the story of RL2 connect to RL1

[Sollaire]

i've just got the true ending and i've been trying to understand how the game connects to the first one, like was abel (the Player) the king who was slain by johanes in the first game, is petrified cain the fountain of youth ? If abel was the king of the first game why tf was he spending money on a fountain of youth. i can't really grasp what happened to get there.

I should mention i din't beat the first game on new game+ so if there might be some stuff im missing here.

[Aeralis]

The king in the first game is his own character. No relation to this game at all.
And yeah, its heavily implied that the Fountain of Youth is Cain's petrified remains.

[Ap2000]

How do you remember anything from RL1? lmao
I couldn't even tell you if it had any story.

[Nathaniel Prime]

The castle you've been upgrading the whole time to power up turns out to be Castle Hamson, the place where RL1 takes place. The king in RL1 (unconnected to any character in RL2) went into Castle Hamson to find the Fountain of Youth, which in RL2 we find out is Cain's petrified corpse. Johannes (a descendant of Johan and Z in RL2) goes into the castle to kill that king. You fight Johannes as the last boss, and when you beat his first form he gets possessed by/merges with/absorbs the power of the Fountain, which is why the final boss of RL1 looks like Cain from RL2.

[Carr]

poop