Since they couldn't move, they sat in silence, their gaze fixed on the beautiful forest before them. It was very different from the horrifying night before.
"It's kinda calming to look at, huh? When I was in the Abyss, most forests died since the sun was blocked."
In the Abyss without sunlight, most vegetation couldn't grow, and most of humanity had to create artificial sources of light to survive. It was only near the end of his journey that this problem was solved when a powerful Light element user created a new sun using the tier 8 spell [False Sun].
"It's been a while since you saw the sun, right? You should've seen Solaris, it was way brighter than this."
As they sat, the need for action took over, and if they wanted to get anything done, they would first need to stretch.
Aria, her eyes narrowed in pain, bent her knee, and massaged her calves. At the same time, Ren stood up, or at least he tried to before being stopped by his left hand as if the hand was attached to something.
It indeed was attached to something, or more specifically, someone.
"Aria? Can you let go?"
Since Aria and Ren had fallen asleep, their hands were holding each other, and to his surprise, they didn't let go in the hours that passed.
"Shouldn't you help me up first?"
"Yea yea, hold tight."
Pulling her up, the two started to stretch before looking around, walking slowly into the opening where they had fought the furred monster.
The grass was slightly shorter in this area, and in the sunlight, they could see clearly, yet as Ren had seen previously, the monster's corpse was missing.
Making their way further through the grass, they approached the area where the monster fell, but all that remained was grass.
"Even the damage disappeared."
"And the crystal is gone."
The two could only frown in astonishment.
All their hard work was for nothing!
The reward of high quality materials and a rank 2 mana crystal was all gone.
"Well, at least we ranked up right? It could be worse."
"But Ren, the… the mana crystal!"
"Aria, it's just a mana cr-"
Aria cut him off.
"Just? Just?! We worked so damn hard for it! Now it's gone… gone forever!"
During Aria's lament, the system window appeared with animated text.
[Congratulations on surviving the night!]
[Hmm, a rank 1, a rank 2, and a weakened rank 3!?]
[Magnificent, truly! Gosh, I really expected the two of you to die, but look where we are.]
"..."
"..."
Aria and Ren stared at the window in silence, causing the system to respond with confusion, its animated text jumping up and down, its words sounding jovial.
[Hm? Why so quiet? Ah! Yes, I need to tell you what you killed, huh? Ahem Ahem..]
The two stared incredulously; the system didn't have a voice, yet oddly, it cleared its throat as if it had one and had a friendly demeanor.
[Congratulations on killing…Rank 1 [Medullis's Pale Harvester], huh? Do I really need to read all of this?! Ugh!]
[Medullis's Pale Harvester: creatures originating from the Pale lord's body, harvesting bones of other creatures they fell into corruption upon the Pale Lord's death during the 2nd Rupture, turning monstrous and being sealed in the forest of blah blah blah, the rest is boring anywa- Ahem, I meant! Read it on your own time.]
Looking away from the window, Aria and Ren stared at each other, communicating with their eyes since messaging required them to use the system.
'Ren, this system… is it alive?'
'A living system? Let's listen for now.'
The two turned back as the system moved onto the next monster
[Rank 3 [Gorge Devourer], as rank 0s, you shouldn't have even touched it, but I suppose, since it was injured and weakened to rank 2, killing it was great… I mean, glorious!]
[Let's see, since the last two are similar, I'll group them. Rank 2 [Offspring of the Gorge Devourer], haha, no wonder it was so angry you killed its parent, how awful, a tragedy!]
The system seemed far from remorseful, instead amused by what happened, but the pair watching frowned, looking at each other.
[Oh? Feeling guilty now? Tsk Tsk, they were corrupted. If you were weak, they would have killed you. Wait, I shouldn't be talking about this. Let's see [Gorge Devourer] similar to the [Pale Harvesters] originate from a god called the Devouring Heaven, oh my, to think you would encounter two creations of divinity, how unlucky!]
'Unlucky…'
Aria frowned, feeling that luck wasn't what caused this sequence of events, but the system cut into her thoughts.
[Anyways, you two truly are amazing. If you have any questions, ask away!]
Aria's and Ren's eyes lit up at the words. Since transmigrating from their second lives to their current third lives, they had plenty of questions; they would be insane if they didn't!
The two looked at each other, and Ren smiled at her, a signal that she should ask first.
"Then… what are you?"
In both their worlds of Solaris and the Abyss, systems weren't a thing people knew about or even conceptualized, since there weren't any webnovels or video games.
Since they were given systems it also didn't have many features, such as the reward system, only acting as a guide by giving them missions or telling them their stats. In fact, the most important thing about the system wasn't what it did for them but what it allowed them to do, which was the messaging function that connected both Aria and Ren together.
That begged the question: What is the system? Even though Aria and Ren had reached rank 8, they still couldn't see through it, at first they thought it was a spell, but Aria, who was a mage, couldn't feel any mana from the system, while Ren, with unnatural senses, felt that the system was no different from air.
[What am I? Don't you remember? I'm the ATLAS System! A guide to the solution!]
Ren's eyes glowed, remembering the phrase; it was what the system said when their systems broke and combined.
"Remember when we first met?"
Their respective systems broke into pieces and combined into this bigger system.
"It said 'Welcome to the Atlas System'."
Aria nodded, then asked another question,
"What is this solution you are guiding us to?"
The system became silent for a couple of moments, the text flickering as if in thought.
[The solution is a guide to kill a being; of course, I will be focusing more on your improvement in rank, not your killing potential, I mean, I'm sure you'd had enough of that in your past lives!]
Their eyes flickered, turning to each other and whispering,
"Ren, it knows about our past life."
"Well, that makes sense, right? The systems were with us during that time."
The system didn't activate at birth; it activated only after they fully recovered their memories of their lives on Earth. The process took many years, and Ren and Aria recalled it just before adulthood. Ren continued speaking,
"Hmm, since it holds both systems, it probably knows about the chat logs in the messaging function, huh?"
"That's… kinda embarrassing, isn't it?!"
Aria, feeling as if her private and potential love life had been leaked, held a slight blush as Ren tilted his head,
"Embarrassing? Why would it?"
Aria stared at Ren's dense expression before shaking her head, retorting emotionally
"J-just ask the next question!"
With a confused look, Ren turned back to the system with a smile,
"So, since you're focusing on improving our rank to kill something, what rank is it anyway?"
Ren wasn't going to kill just because he was told to, even though he lived a chaotic life; he, at the very least, kept his morality. But he decided that, in the present, extracting as much information would be best before deciding what to do.
[What rank? Isn't it obvious Rank 10!]
"Rank 10?"
Ren asked with a frozen face, his smile disappearing.
[Rank 10!]
Watching from the side, Aria tapped his arm
"Ren… It's speaking bullshit. Let's ignore it."
Staring for a couple of moments, Ren nodded in agreement as they both turned away from the system.
[W-Wait! Don't ignore me, h-haven't I been helpful in your last life!]
Aria's eyes twitched as she retorted in anger,
"Helpful? Helpful!? All you give us are stats and status! And they're shoddy at best. When I was poisoned, I felt it was pretty damn obvious when I was coughing blood! You couldn't even give me a warning beforehand!?"
Ren looked in surprise at Aria's anger
'Whoa, she's mad, mad, but….'
He started to feel angry himself.
"She's right! What about the reward system? Are you so poor you can't afford to share some scraps for us during our lower ranks!? You're oh so mysterious, but mystery doesn't help us kill gods! Do you know how much time I wasted finding potions!?"
"Yeah, he's right! Do you think we have a perfect memory?! How can I remember a hidden easter egg after 20 years?! You could've given us a mission or some kind of marker! That's right! Those missions as well! 'Survive the night'?! You might as well tell us that we need to breathe to live!"
The system's animated test flickered even more in what seemed to be bewilderment.
[N-now now calm down, you two uh.. what about the messaging system? You can't deny the connection fostered between the support of each other, right?]
Ren frowned. The system was good in that regard, but the rest was total garbage.
Aria let out a 'tsk' before asking,
"Why should we even kill a rank 10 being anyway? Can't we just ignore you?"
The system's flickering stopped at those words; it appeared as if the system took on a serious tone.
[Ah, ignore me? You can do that, but you should know if you don't listen…]
The system's text turned bolder.
[You'll die]