Today must not be my day because my phone submitted my post before I was finished outlining my issue. To continue...
When I next rebooted my PC into windows, it showed the Windows splash screen for a moment, then the screen goes black except for those swirling dots indicating Windows is doing something; however, it just keeps doing that.
I couldn't get it to boot to Windows recovery, so I tried an install disk in the hopes that I could utilize it to access said recovery. However, it only gives me the message that it appears I rebooted in the middle of an upgrade, and if I want to continue that upgrade I should boot into windows, or I can proceed with a fresh install from disk.
My questions are these:
How did I end up with a Windows.old folder when I did a fresh install and deleted all partitions of the previous system drive?
Why did deleting Windows.old cause my computer to crash when it pertains to an OS that is no longer active?
Finally, is there any way I can recover from this without a re-install, or is that simply to be my punishment?
I know, I know you use disk cleanup to remove Windows.old... now. Regardless, I don't understand how deleting that folder could cause the issues in having.
I did a fresh install of Windows 10 Pro 64-bit earlier today. When I booted into the operating system I found a Windows.old in the root of my c: drive. Confused at how I got a Windows.old folder when I did a fresh install AND when I manually reformatted all partitions of my previous windows installation during the Windows install process, including the recovery partition, I went ahead to remove it manually (by taking permissions of the folder and hitting shift+delete).
Text when I reboot my computer it would begin to boot into Windows delete showing the Windows splash screen

Chowhound
Comic Vine
GameFAQs
GameSpot
Giant Bomb
TechRepublic