They were now standing right before a small dilapidated garden lot of an abandoned building. The flora was overgrown due to undercare with weeds springing up through cracks in the sidewalk and the grass came to their knees. They walked past the broken birdbath in the middle of the forgotten garden and to the back of the lot. There was a faded mural painting of a much more picturesque garden than the one they were in. They wondered if the actual garden may have resembled the painting some time long ago
"This is the place. Do the thing." Nera commanded. "Take out the sculpture in your jacket's pocket."
"Huh?" Confused, Allen still did what he was told and found a miniature sculpture. It possessed the shape of a piece of vine with thorns and glowed with emerald light.
"What is this supposed to be?"
"That was the core of that Specter, a Dream Sculpture. It's probably the source of magic Wit is intending for you to use to get into the Underside," Nera answered.
"The cores of Specters are art? Why is that for?"
The young woman shrugged. "Art is a really effective conduit for magic. Specters are basically made of magic, so I guess their cores just form like that naturally."
Allen peered closer at the Dream Sculpture.
"Okay, I can understand that but isn't miasma harmful to living things? Is this even safe for me to use?"
Nera sighed. "Miasma is just mana corrupted by a Specter. Once the Specter's destroyed, the miasma it had will slowly turn back to normal, although you were unfortunate enough to still be harmed by it even after the Expanse closed. It's the only reason you're wearing those bandages right now."
Allen looked even more perplexed than before. "Only reason? What about getting an axe straight to my chest?"
"You really don't know anything about this whole Underworld stuff and you're about to walk in there totally clueless. For your sake, it's a good thing I'll be there."
She was met with an unamused groan and continued her explanation.
"Alright, you see Expanses are like dreams. They can be exited without any physical changes sticking to you or anything else that enters them, as long the Expanse breaks down first though.'
"...And that's what happened last night." Allen surmised.
"Bingo. All of the injuries that we received during the dream went away after it ended. The ones you have now are because you were touching the Dream Sculpture afterward before all its miasma turned back into regular mana."
"I see..that's pretty unfair." Allen looked over his bandaged hands, wondering what kind of wounds were left behind. "Wait, if all our injuries would've gone away. Why did that woman retreat just because her knight in shining armor was wounded?"
Nera walked ahead of him a little and glanced back. "Simple, physical ones don't stick but mental changes do. It's why we still have memories of the whole thing. Pass out in an Expanse and you might never see the walking world again. Now, enough of this, go ahead and use that Dream Page."
Allen gulped and thought about the most effective method to unlock the Dream Sculpture's power.
"Usta! Circumeo!" He chanted loudly at the greenish rock using what little Latin he had picked up from reading books about Greek Mythology while Nera was staring at him like he had lost his mind.
"What the freak are you doing?"
Allen lowered his hand and looked at her with a straight face.
"What did you expect? I have no idea how this mana stuff is supposed to work. Got any tips?'
"I don't know either. Hold on, what was that last thing he said? 'Don't focus on what you can perceive with your senses, and instead of what you can't', right? Try that."
"That's easy to say, but I'll try it anyway."
Allen closed his eyes and tried to block out everything he was perceiving with his senses, the sensation of the warm air faintly blowing on him, the heat of the sun, the weight of his clothes, even the feeling of the stone in his hand. He blocked all of this out and continued to do so until, eventually, he felt something apart from them. It was not like anything he experienced before, resembling a flowing river of metal, amorphous but tangible and dense. When he was sure he would not lose track of this feeling, he allowed himself to tune into all his other senses and open his eyes.
He saw the page in his hand, but could now feel that flowing sensation coming from it, he then glanced over to see that Nera had a hand on his shoulder.
"You ready?"
He nodded his head in reply and then tried envisioning the flowing mana from the stone enveloping the two, and in response, the mana began emanating from it and gradually began to surround the both of them. As this happened, it felt like a thick fog was covering their bodies, but they could not actually see anything with Allen being the only one to be able to feel the mana.
"I'm actually using magic...awesome," he muttered almost soundlessly.
Next, the two walked towards the mural painting on the wall and tried to push through it. At first, nothing happened and they wondered if they had done something wrong, but after much effort and Nera having to hold Allen's hand to make sure she did not lose her aura, they eventually managed to force their way through the solid wall of brick.
When they emerged on the other side, they had to catch themselves from falling after suddenly meeting no resistance from the wall. Allen and Nera pumped their hands up in the air in celebration after they had toiled to get past the magical barrier. They then looked around to see that they were now standing in a resplendent and well-kept garden covered in lush foliage and trees with a giant fountain in the middle. Further on ahead, it lead to a bustling city street.
"Ahh!" Nera yelped as she noticed something moving under them as they approached the outside of the garden with Allen being startled as well when he looked down, A giant monstrous serpent was moving along the streets under them and continued to travel past onto the buildings as well like an animated picture. Neither could tell how this was happening or where the source of the image was as they followed it throughout the path of this strange new part of Atelier City they had never seen before.
Many of the buildings were modern-looking skyscrapers like the ones in the rest of Atelier City, but there were also a few skyscrapers that were made of wood instead of metal, and at the center of the area was a colossal castle made out of futuristic materials with a streamlined design and an image on it that paid no mind to any kind of borders such as windows just like the moving image of the serpent. Overall, the layout of the area reminded Allen somewhat of places like Akihabara with all sorts of outlandish iconography such as fantastical creatures and items.
Similarly, a large portion of the people here wore outfits that were a strange mix of medieval and futuristic clothing consisting of robes, tunics, and cloaks with glowing lines running over them. Up above, the sky was a very dark shade of blue, almost black. However, the area was still illuminated greatly by what appeared to be an exceedingly bright Aurora Borealis stretching across the sky and a glowing crescent moon in the center of it.
"This place is in the Underworld isn't it?"
"Yeah, you're not as fast at thinking as you are at climbing are you?"
"Seems like you were a bit behind the uptake as well." Allen retorted glancing at Nera also being completely captivated by the wondrous sky above them.
He stood there watching her watch the Aurora for longer than he would have liked to admit. Sometime later, he realized their fingers were still intertwined and slowly let go.
Allen slammed his fist into his palm, the sound snapping Nera out of her daze. "Alright, now that we're here. Let's go ahead and find where the post office is so we can deliver Wit's letter. I don't like owing people favors."
"Yea...yeah. Sure, all we need to do is find one of those trolleys, and we can ask it to take us there."
Allen began to look over to see if he can find any but Nera was already pointing in the direction of one in the other direction of where they were looking.
When they walked over to the front door of the trolley, they could clearly tell that there were no passengers inside and that it was fully automated with a place for money to be inserted in order to open the door of the trolley car. After they both paid their toll, they walked inside the trolley. Where the driver's seat would normally be, there was a holographic screen that displayed different locations along its route with there appearing to be an option to pick between them. One of them in particular that caught Allen's attention was "Neo Hanging Gardens of Babylon", but he kept going through them until he found "Underside Post Office" and selected it.
Immediately, the trolley began accelerating through the streets at breakneck speeds.
"It's odd that this trolley doesn't have any trolley tracks." Allen pondered out loud.
"It's probably just for the look, a lot of junk in Atelier is like that, there are even actual horseless carriages."
"I guess so, but still..."
As if to answer his questions, trolley tracks began to mystically form in front of the trolley car with magical symbols strewn on them rising up high into the air, reaching the tops of the skyscrapers. Nera looked at Allen with a beaming smile.
"Looks like I was wrong after all, Allen. This is going to be mega awesome. I've always wanted to ride a roller coaster."
Allen began clutching one of the trolley bars with an iron grip and smirked with sweat beads forming on his head.
"Yeah, the best rides are usually the scariest aren't they?" He uttered as the speeding trolley ran onto the tracks and started rapidly ascending high into the sky.
***
After reaching the post office that was on top of one of the buildings and handing off Wit's letter there, they then asked the head post office worker, Cohen Andrews, where they could find information about specters and magical incidents.
"The Bastion, it's where all specter business is handled and where Underside records are collected for public viewing. "
They both thanked him and went back to their personal roller coaster to travel to the Bastion.
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