"Why…"
"How…"
"ARE YOU HERE?!", they shouted in unison.
With fingers pointing at one another, both with narrowed eyes, Ren looking up and down from the name tag above Aria's head to her face, while Aria closed and opened her eyes as if denying her current reality,
Their shouts, soon turned into a strange silence, as they slowly dropped their hands still staring at each other, Ren's mouth opened first speaking with slight surprise,
"So you really were a lady…"
At his words, a slight irritation welled up causing her to frown, hand tidying her hair, the other pointing at Ren once more,
"Yea, obviously! And here I thought you were an old man…"
"Old man? We've known each other for what? 20.. 30 years? If I'm old, you're old too!"
Aria's eyes widening with shock, shouting back in retaliation,
"I'm only old when I want to be old!"
"What kind of logic is that…?"
Letting out a sigh, Aria in turn turned her head away with a pout. They had talked tens of thousands of times in the past, though it was only through a system where they couldn't see each other's face or hear each other's voice
'It really is her.'
'He really is here.'
But despite that, whether it be the emotions they felt or the way they spoke, it felt so familiar, that at this moment, an understanding was formed. that the person in front of them was really the same person from the system.
'Ms. Star… someone I've known for ages.'
'Though her language is very different'
The last message she had sent had her speaking in fancy tones and using quotes a bunch, though this only occurred about,
'2.. No.. probably a year ago.. Something about needing to practice sounding like a monarch.'
The current Aria was actually how she communicated for the majority of their friendship, a friendly and joking person.
Ren had talked with her when he first started his adventure in the Abyss, when he was sad at the death of his master, or happy at a success in his journey when he defeated the first subordinate of the Ash God, the same could also be said with Aria,
It was obvious that the emotions flow throughout his body would be positive, a warm smile plastered on his face,
For there wasn't a reason not to, for the person in front of him was someone he shouldn't be frowning at or being sad to meet, this was a joyous occasion, one that would only happen once,
Their first meeting,
A smile to a friend, from years ago to the present,
"It's nice to meet you Ms. Star…"
Her eyes widened, breath seemingly stopping at his words, eyes flickering before returning with a smile of her own,
"Likewise Mr. Night."
Bright, the smile was even brighter than the sunshine draping the forest.
…
After greeting each other, in order to get up to speed they started talking about their situation,
"So.. when did you first wake up Ms. Star?"
They were currently walking in the forest looking around at its seemingly infinite array of trees, the leaves waved with the soft breeze, it was quite the picturesque sight, but their first order of business was to find a source of water causing them to be less focused on the beauty,
When asked the question Aria held her chin counting in her head,
"About 4 hours ago."
"So it's about the same as me. You were fighting that person the… Witch of Calamity right?"
In Aria's past life, similar to Ren she was sent into the game world from a game she had been playing, though it wasn't a Soulslike game judging by what she had to do, it wasn't any less difficult than what Ren had gone through,
The reminder of what she had gone through caused Aria's face to turn into an annoyed scowl whining while bringing up the recent memories,
"Hah… I managed to win with my trump card, but that bitc-, she blew herself up with me like some…. fucking glorified human firework!"
Her attempt to not curse was futile as her expression grew more and more frustrated she cursed with a slight shout,
"Why the hell is someone like that in a dating sim anyways!?"
Grabbing the ends of her shoulder length hair, she grit her teeth while squeezing them in annoyance all while shaking her head, soon after her anger slightly subsiding yet still present she gave Ren a curious look,
"How about you Mr. Night? You also failed right?"
"That I did. Don't look so down Ms. Star, not only did I fail, I got blown up as well."
As Ren started regaling his grand tale, Aria stared incredulously sighing,
"How… Reassuring"
They continued to walk.
…
"Do you not feel anything while looking at me?"
"No? Why do you keep asking me that?"
They had been walking for nearly an hour with no water in sight as the question was once against asked, she had been asking the same question over and over again like some parrot, in response Ren, matched her energy and repeated the answer he had been giving her,
'Odd… is it actually gone?', bad memories of a certain problem plaguing her former life appeared before disappearing as she smiled,
"I was just trying to confirm something, anyways I was wondering, how did you move your body so well back there?"
"Do you mean when you hit me with that wind blast?"
"Yea.. you blocked pretty well." Both her tone and the smile on her face were apologetic, she still felt slight guilt for attacking him whether he was someone she knew or didn't.
Aria had noticed that Ren had blocked the more sensitive areas of his body like his neck or eyes, he had also taken a stance that made his sword absorb the most amount of impact from her attack,
In addition although creating space from a mage wasn't ideal, by jumping back when the spell was launched and allowing it to push him back, Ren sustained the least amount of damage possible in that situation,
Having known him for a long time, she knew he wasn't a slouch when it came to combat and was strong in his past life, but since this was a new life entirely, his movements were way too smooth for someone who just woke up in a new body and with no memories causing her to be curious .
Although Aria hadn't attacked him with the intention to actually hurt him, if she did, her attack wouldn't have done much damage, only grazing him shallowly.
Ren fell into thought his fingers propping his chin before he answered,
"How did I? Well.. I noticed this earlier but this body feels very natural to me."
"Natural?"
"Yes.."
Nodding, he gave a brief explanation about his body and how it was much more talented than in his past life, how he felt oddly more familiar with it than he should have been, and how odd it was considering he had only recently started using it a couple hours ago,
"Physical, magical talent… and barely no delay ?" Aria listed the main points.
"That's right."
Falling into thought her eyes glowed slightly, recognizing the cause.
"Ah! Your soul must be compatible with the body."
"My soul? But my current build and power is completely different from my past life. If anything, shouldn't I be flailing around like a fish out of water?"
Aria smiled raising a finger,
"Well, if you were sent to your past body from the future would you be able to control the body well?"
Ren's past memories flowed, he had once fought with a soul mage, this person swapped bodies when they were about to die in order to extend their life, although Ren himself knew little about soul magic he remembered some of their words as he responded,
"The mind changes as we age and adapt to our growing body, so I shouldn't have complete control in a younger body, but… I would be able to control it better than if I were just sent into a random body, I've been told the soul is formed to be compatible with the body upon birth."
"That's correct, the body is the perfect glove for the hand that is the soul, just as the body grows with the soul the soul grows with the body…"
An oddly excited smile appeared on Aria's face,
'Wasn't she a soul mage in her past?'
As the fact came to Ren, Aria continued,
"So! A soul can't truly be in a body it isn't compatible with..."
"The fact that you can use your body well indicates the soul is compatible with the body and brings up the question…"
Ren's eyes glowed figuring out what Aria was trying to ask,
"Why are we so compatible with these bodies? When we have nothing to do with them?"
Aria nodded,
"That's right, the soul is tightly connected to the body and houses the mark of a person's existence, our souls come from our fully grown bodies from our former lives, as such our soul is also considered 'fully grown', so why are these younger bodies that have never grown with our souls so compatible?"
"It probably has to do with our current situation, I also felt the same way with my own body, though it's more on the magical aspect, I can clearly feel what I can and can't do with my mana in fact my mana is much more dense than it should be at this level."
Aria's hand shimmered motes of golden light as she showed it to Ren, he felt the dense mana coating her hands.
"But when I move my body I feel stiff and my hand moves with a slight delay."
Aria then moved her hand back and forth, although it looked smooth, when you looked closer, Aria's eyes were looking ahead of the hand's movements.
In turn Ren looked at his hand, it's pale color concerning as it was was the least of his current concerns, questions about why he was here and why Ms. Star, someone who he knew, was also here were what filled his mind,
Could he have been sent here for a purpose, or was he just given another chance, maybe his soul drifted to this unknown world, if that was case then why didn't he have any memories of the body and why was Ms.Star here as well, during this moment, a thought came to him,
"We haven't checked the system yet, have we?"
"Yes, It might have answers.. But…"
Aria soon frowned, Ren confused, soon realized why, as the familiar golden outlined rectangular system window appeared,
"The system… isn't working", looking at the rectangular window, it was completely blank not displaying the usual stats or levels it had previously,
"Oh! The messaging function still works.", Smiling, Aria concentrated on the messaging window.
Ms. Star: [Mr. Night! I-I just met this weird guy in the forest… and.. and he says he's you!]
As the rectangular system notification window popped up in Ren's view, he frowned while looking at it,
"Ms. Star… I'm right here"
"Hehe, I.. was just making sure."
…
The sun started to set as the soft scent of the tree leaves filled their nostrils, a cool breeze brushed against their skin and hair, as the wind made the susurration of the many tree leaves audible throughout the entirety of the forest, and as the sun dipped slowly with the cooling world, revealed in the sky was a unique 2 moons floating near each other.
It was completely pitch black, though their eyes soon got used to the dark, the moonlight nor the stars didn't seem bright enough to light their surroundings leaving them to only see mere meters ahead.
To both of them, though the situation was odd, having gone through a chaotic magical world once before, they kept an unusual calm.
"Two moons? How unique.", Ren stared up with focus
"Is something wrong?"
"No… or maybe yes? I just have this odd feeling that something isn't right.", Ren slightly frowned, looking down he noticed the hair of his forearm standing on end.
Aria head tilted, confused at his response as she also looked at the two moons,
"Two moons are odd, but isn't this a world of magic? If anything, Earth is the weird one for having only one, in fact during my time in Solaris it had twelv-"
Aria didn't finish her sentence as she paused, looking at the moon, her eyes widened before frowning similarly to Ren.
"You feel it right?"
"Well, I can also see it."
The world was filled with mana, Ren could feel it while Aria took it a step further, her eyes glowed as the particles of mana were revealed in front of her.
The moonlight shone softly, to an observer it was a beautiful sight, especially on the vibrant leaves of the forest yet,
"The mana changed in atmosphere, it now feels like looking at a mirage."
"Mirage? That's one way to describe it. To me it feels like I'm being squeezed from all directions."
Aria looked around, the tree leaves still swayed the same way as before, their vibrant colors though less noticeable in the night were still a beautiful sight, though the way the trees were placed in an oddly uniform way,
'Like it's artificial…', Aria frowned looking behind them.
Ren continued to move forward and he heard the sound of rushing water nearby, with slight joy Ren turned to Aria.
"Ms. Star, I heard a stream up ahead. We should gather some water and set up camp… Ms. Star?"
Oddly Aria had stopped walking, leaving her a couple steps behind Ren and his question, she was standing still looking behind them with a weary yet sharp expression hand tightly gripping her staff, her eyes glowed softly with mana acting as the only source of light other than the moonlight,
It was an indication she was getting ready for something,
'For what?'
The question only lingered for a moment as Ren turned to look, during this turn he heard the sound of rustling grass and footsteps echoing from a distance away. As he scanned his heart seemingly stilled,
There it was, about 9-10 meters away, despite the darkness, core features could be made out with unnerving clarity,
4 limbs, yet Ren could discern finger tips, 6 in total, on each of its 2 hands, much like a human, but for some reason it crawled on all fours across the grass, its hind limbs were its feet having 6 toes each,
But that was the least unnerving thing, its skin was a sickly pale white, hairless, and smooth, with a skinny body making out a thin and gaunt, almost corpse-like figure, the bones of its skeleton desperately trying to escape the body.
But even that wasn't the most fear-inducing part, surrounded by the darkness of night and the shade of the trees on its bald head were 2 eyes, no mouth, ears, or nose in sight, hollow and pitch black these eyes stared back at the two.
1...2…3…4…
Seconds passed, before suddenly a hole opened on the lower part of its face revealing a similarly pitch black mouth, reaching all the way to the chin of the head.
This mouth made a series of sounds, something similar to a person gasping for air, then a whimper, a cry, and finally….
A blood-curdling scream all while lunging at the two mouth agape.
'What the hell is that!?'Ren's eyes widened.
'Damn it!' Aria, still with a focused and weary expression unlike her internal shock, readied herself.
[Tier 1: Wind Blade!]
She quickly pushed back to create distance all while simultaneously casting a wind blade at maximum output, a green crescent shaped light cleaved through the air rapidly reaching for the head of the monster,
Black blood with a hint of red splattered, yet Aria grit her teeth, as on the ground wasn't the monster's head but merely its arm.
It had dodged the fatal attack, even though it had lost an arm it continued blitzing ahead reaching them in a blink of the eye, Ren unsheathed his sword thrusting it into the mouth of the monster, as it entered the pitch black mouth,
The sound of cutting flesh could be heard, causing it to let out a choked cry swatting towards Ren's chest with its remaining hand,
'Strong!', despite blocking with his free forearm he was launched a couple meters back tumbling with the sword still in his grip.
The monster crouched coughing up more black blood while dazed by the attack, Aria raised her staff without hesitation moving it in a cutting motion.
[Tier 1: Wind Blade!]
But once more the monster avoided death, blocking the attack by some miraculous instinct, but it didn't just lose its remaining arm like in the last attack, it had also been cut deep into its neck and stomach,
Its charge was slowed! But Aria was far from pleased,
'2 more seconds to cast! I don't have enough time!'
The monster's mouth opened before Aria in an instant, its size was bigger than her head. She couldn't cast it in time nor was she physically fast enough to retreat, she would die!
But then a sword flew pass her face embedding into the forehead of the monster staggering it,
Aria with widened eyes, smiled and raised the staff once more,
[Tier 1: Wind Blade!]
Black blood gushed everywhere, the monster fell onto its knees, head a distance away, but unnerving it still twitched, Ren slowly approached dagger in hand pulling his sword out.
"Thank you Mr. Night"
"Mhm, what even is this thing anyways?"
But before that question could be answered blood curling screams and loud roars were heard echoing through the entire forest, a familiar ding was heard,
[System Notification]
It seemed a long night was ahead of them.