After Suzuka finishes rubbing my head, we all continue to look up and see enormous objects up above us.”
The guide says to everyone, “Now that we are parting from the astral sea and are getting close to Elpída, I would like to tell you a few things. First of all the layout of my beloved country. OWO.
Elpída is six enormous oval-shaped platforms, which are at the highest point in the sky than any other object in the how world. They are split up from platforms one to six, and all have different specialisations which are all equally useful ଘ(੭*ˊᵕˋ)੭*.
Though I would suggest staying off of the sixth platform, it isn’t the most heavily monitored platform, so there are a plethora of illegal activities going on over there, but if you want to engage in said morally corrupt activities, you will definitely enjoy your time there ◕‿↼).
Taking about laws, as visitors, you have three strikes before you are able to be punished by law, you get busted by the law three times then they have the right to punish you for all your worth, some of them have some pent-up stress so I will not confirm whether brutality might happen or not. But slipping some lupas into their pockets could make them gain sudden amnesia ✌.ʕʘ‿ʘʔ.✌.
Regardless of whatever activities you get into I would suggest not stealing anything, most things in this country can only be used in this country. So all you will be doing is getting yourself put on a blacklist (ಥ_ಥ).
And not the last few things: our national language is the heaven’s song, but the Heroes song is also used a lot, if you can’t speak those two you're probably fucked.
We accept money of any and all kinds, exchange rates are for each individual shop so keep that in mind, and finally, I hope you enjoy your stay at Elpída the city in the future that was formed in the past.” After she says all this I see her victoriously say, “Yes, just made it in time.”
And just like that the whale spits out our bubbles at incredible speed sending us into one of the six platforms. When we arrive, the guide tells us, “Please everyone jump out of your bubbles and continues down the hall.”
Following her instructions, we go down the hall until we reached a point where we could see outside, and when we did, we all saw people moving through the sky on objects, and buildings that reach the sky.
Me, Atalanta, and Suzuka stopped to look at the sight with wonder, but Cyrus grabs and takes us down the hall where we see another guide, who says, “Welcome to Elpída the most advanced civilisation in the world, I hope you enjoy your stay, but before that, I need to receive payment for all of your stay. So, I need you guys to pay me -Censor- Lupas.”
One of the other travellers says, “That’s utterly ridiculous, do you know how much that is.”
“As I told you we are the most technologically advanced city in the world, so the sights and things you could see here are not something you could see anywhere else, I think for an experience such as this, paying up that amount isn’t an issue, and this also goes towards our protection laws, we didn’t have to give visitors immunity, but we did since we are all so nice, you should be grateful and stop complaining. So, the rest of you please pay us without any issue teehee.”
So, all of us pay her the fee, I feel sort of bad that all the money we were giving is being used for such frivolous things, instead of buying food for everyone back at the tunnels, but I did give Willow about half of the ridiculous money we were given, so they should be able to get some supplies to throw the use of the members of Gaia’s sky.
And are told by her, “I hope you enjoy your stay, walking through this door behind me you will have another door to walk through before you leave, and since you guys have been so well behaved I will give you a bit of advice, look and walk forward empty everything else from my mind if you do you won’t be having to leave immediately.”
Around the end of her sentence, she changed her tone, are the workers here stable? As we enter the next room, I see that it isn’t a corridor but a giant area with tons of shops lining the sides. When we start walking down this area, people run up to us and say, “You fine people must have come from the lower world, would you like to do some shopping.”
“You should ignore that man, he is a liar, he will scam you, so you should come to my store, I will do my best to make you walk off with the best Elpída has to offer.”
“Don’t listen to that man, everything at his store is trash, come over to mine for some real high-quality goods.”
I am starting to see what the guide was talking about, to reach the exit we have to get through this horde of money-sucking parasites, this isn’t going to be easy. Looking over at Suzuka I see she is looking sort of ill, so I ask her “Are you ok.”
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“To, many, annoying, thoughts.”
I forgot she can be overwhelmed easily, so I raise my voice and say, “We are good now leave us alone,” while grabbing everyone and moving forward.
This whole shopping area is incredibly predatory, by placing all these pushy people before we even get a chance to look around, they can make us buy on impulse it is horrible.
Thinking back, they specifically placed a corridor where we could see the outside of Elpída before we had to pay. That was set up in a way that our wonder and intrigue by entering the city, would cloud our judgment and make us pay their stupidly high price, without truly thinking.
I wonder if I could use a variation of this when I get to eventually sell the crystals from Basileia. While I was lost in thought, I noticed that both Atalanta and Cyrus are missing, looking over at Cyrus I run over and here a salesperson say, “If you take this medicine it will give you courage and make all your stuttering go away.”
“R-R-Really!”
“I guarantee, you can trust me. Also, no refunds.”
I run up to Cyrus and grab him, then drag him away, which causes the shop owner to say, “That’s obstruction of business.”
“Question, do you want to die.”
Letting out a scream the man says, “That’s a crime. Buy something right now, or I will tell law enforcement that you have just threatened me.”
Walking up to him I say, “Let me tell you if I get arrested on any charges before I am I taken away I will make sure to kill you. That’s a promise.”
Frighten by my words the man falls on his ass. I then go over to Atalanta, where I hear someone tell her, “This is the elavice, a type of wine that can only be made on Elpída. It is made from berries that can only grow in our special gravity field, with it also being aged fifty years; I know you will love it.”
“That sounds amazing I want to try some.” I hit Atlanta on the head and grab the bottle saying, “Look before you buy. The bottle has a price tag from another store still on it, and the name of it is cheap wine in the heaven’s song, this bitch is trying to use your lack of knowledge to scam you.”
As we all move away, people still keep coming up to us with their never-ending pitches for us to come to their shops.
“We have fibres you have never seen before.”
“We have technology that will let you dry your clothes in seconds.”
“We have medicine that stimulates growth in all areas of the body, with absolutely no side effects.”
“By drinking are astral water you can look over twenty years younger.”
“My shop is having a special fifty percent off deal, but for you guys, I will make it seventy-five percent off, doesn’t that sound utterly amazing.”
My god, “SHUT UP AND GO AWAY YOU PARASITES!”
Then someone says, “Come all buyers, right here right now, we have a new selection of wonderbeasts from the astral sea, don’t miss your chance to get one as either a pet or food if it strikes you so.”
Hearing this, my body moves on its own and walks over to the shop. This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to get to have a special wonderbeast as a pet, I can’t let this chance go buy, I will be able to dissect it and figure out how the wonderbeasts up here work. “Sir how much will that be.”
“Oh a buyer, it will be -Censor- lupas. Do you have that much kid?”
“Yes, I have that much, fork over the wonderbeast.” Starring at its cage I say, “I can’t wait to rip you apart.” The wonder beast looks scared in its cage due to me.
Suddenly Atalanta, Cyrus, and Suzuka grab me, carrying me out of the shop they say, “Orb we can’t let you do that.”
While they are taking me out another one of the visitors who came with us, buys the wonderbeast for their child; “NOOOO!” I scream as I watch my hopes and dreams be shattered.
As I see the boy and his family walk away with the wonderbeast, I move right on over to the boy and kneel in front of him saying, “Since that wonderbeasts natural habitat is specifically for Elpída, once you take it home with you it will probably die in no time, leaving you with nothing but its corpse. Animals are alive too, so by buying that wonderbeast all you have done is murder an animal, to think such a young boy would already be committing murders.”
As the boy starts crying, Suzuka hits me in the face but I say, “I just wanted it why can’t I have it,” with tears in my eyes.
Suzuka picks me up by the hand and guides me back to everyone saying, “Don’t worry it will be ok.”
Huddled up, all of us move as one unit, not letting anything distract us, we continue like this until we are about to reach the exit, but suddenly our momentum is brought to a halt, and Suzuka stopped moving. Looking at her, I see that she is looking into a clothes shop. “Suzuka were almost outside, so let’s go, we have almost escaped this hellscape of parasites.”
“Sorry about that, it is just that I have never bought any clothes.”
“Wait, but your fourteen.”
“All the clothes I have are uniforms from my dad's dojo, and the clothes I was given when I was at Himeji castle, that’s all the clothes I have ever worn. Sorry about making you worry, I am being selfish let's go.”
Seeing her expression, I know what I need to do, “Everyone let us all go clothes shopping.”
Suzuka gets a big smile on her face as we all walk into the shop, where her and Atlanta pick out new clothes for all of us. Walking out of the store, the happiness of our group has increased, but our almost of money has significantly gone down.
Finally, as we walk out the door we are brought outside, where we see more of the sights we saw before, people in the air and buildings in the sky. As we gaze at these sights I man walks up to us in an outfit similar to our first guide but a male version and says, “Travellers I will be your last guide today. ლ(◉❥◉ ლ).”
The man in question is very flirty to all of us, and is just as lively as our first guide. “You are probably taken aback by the sights you are seeing in front of you, but all the people in the sky are those who are taken advantage of the special gravity field in our country. (✿◦’ᴗ˘◦)♡.
As long as you are near the ground, the gravity field will act like normal but if you are a certain height away from the ground, you will act in zero gravity which is what everyone else is doing, so remember this to be safe. Now if you have any more questions, there are maps all over the city which will point you towards one of our law enforcement stations the Gravitas police force or Gpd for short. (ᇴ‿ฺᇴ).
Now finally if you want to maximise your time getting around, I would also suggest renting a transport vehicle, to take through one of our cities gravity roads. I hope you enjoy your stay in our country.