you made me remember petrification also stopped the timer, so your hypotesis you didn't believe of the timer being his time perception might be correct.
the timer might stop with his pause button too because he doesn't perceive the world flowing in time, and when he is stopped also.
ch1:
proceeds to fight a bandit gang all alone without skills in a magic world, where he previously died to 2 normal human burglars.
i rarely see someone this dumb and so much plot armor.