TO SURVIVE THIS REALM

Checky looked at the list again. He was laying down comfortably on the sofa in the living room. It was Saturday and only the three of them were left in the apartment. Nami had gone to work before they even woke up. She had left the list for Checky, made by her while the others had gone to sleep early.

Phantom tried practising his skills in the room, something he usually did while on board Lumiere. Cards ceased to heed his commands, though, and they did not fly in a circle as per norm. Luminous couldn't do anything without his spells, so he tried to read some of Nami's books. His evil presence was not threatening to show, thankfully, but neither was his luminosity.

Checky looked at the list again. It was made on a rather small piece of paper, smaller than his palm. He eyed the fifteen names which were scribbled in pencil and hence appearing rather faint and glittery. "Still rather messy," he thought to himself as he assessed her handwriting.

His stomach rumbled, reminding him that he - and the others - had not had breakfast. He sat up and looked across to Luminous, who was sitting on the floor reading a book. The coffee table stood between them.

"Hey Luminous, you hungry?" Checky asked.

Luminous turned towards Checky. "No, I am…" Before he could finish, a rather loud rumble sounded from Luminous.

"I'll take that as a yes then," said Checky, giggling. He stood up and tried to look around Nami's apartment. There was nothing in the refrigerator, nothing in the kitchen cupboards. In short, there was no food left in the apartment. Neither was there any money for them. Nami must have left this out.

He figured Nami would not return in a few more hours so he had to somehow get some money for food. He returned to the living room, where Phantom and Luminous were. Phantom came out from the room and complained about his hunger.

"So it means we all need something to eat," Checky concluded. "But first, we need money."

Phantom's eyes lit up. "Money, you say?" He stood up and hurried back to the room. In less than a minute, Phantom came back to the living room, this time with his hat and robe.

"Err Phantom, you don't…" Checky tried to stop Phantom.

"No worries, I'll be right back as soon as possible."

"Phantom!" Checky called out, but Phantom had already vanished through the front door, leaving Luminous utterly confused.

"Sigh, I just remembered," said Checky as he took his wallet out and opened it. "Yep, still here, wonder if it still works…"

Phantom approached the entrance of what seemed to be a subway station. Below the sign that held the words 'Dhoby Ghaut' and beyond, the midday sun had bought in crowds of swift-paced workaholics and tourists wandering yonder. A few heads turned to Phantom's street-magician-like costume, but most hurried on their own ways, hardly paying any attention to him.

"A rushing and oblivious crowd…lovely! Just what need to nab some of the local greens," Phantom said to himself. He had done this a lot of times even before the first encounter with the Black Mage. He readied himself, his hunger pestering him to make haste.

With a deep sigh of breath, Phantom swiftly - and skillfully - made his way through the crowd and down the escalator, claiming wads and wallets and purses to himself each time his hands brushed across the pockets of the unknowing ones. He quickly found a toilet when he arrived just before the gantries and darted into the cubicle, catching attention from a few passers-by. Bill after bill he flipped as he counted his rewards.

"Interesting designs…three thousand, not bad for a rookie in this world," Phantom muttered, satisfied.

Phantom kept the bills in his pocket and walked out of the toilet, poker-faced as ever, into the still-oblivious crowd. He left all the wallets and purses in the cubicle, though. "Enough for the day," he thought as he ascended the flight of stairs back to the road. "You guys do need more exercise," his heart mocked the crowd formed at the escalator.

Turning back to the direction of the apartment, he felt two taps on his shoulder from behind. He turned around and was caught by surprise when he saw two handsomely-uniformed men approaching him.

"Excuse me sir," one of them spoke, "but you look quite suspicious in your clothes. Please come with us back to the police station."

"This is the outfit for police officers here? They look kinda funny," he thought for a second. Nonetheless, he knew he was trapped in a sticky situation, but he decided to oblige. Perchance there might be a loophole for him to pull a narrow escape. Seeing as more people turned their heads towards them, Phantom hesitated no more and followed the two cops. Half of him was still thinking how they knew what he had done. Or maybe they didn't. He would eventually be found out if he did not escape, though.

The crowd diminished little by little as the three of them went on. Phantom reached his right hand into his pocket. He felt them, his deck of cards. He wanted to try his powers again and see if it would help him escape, but his cards wouldn't budge no matter how hard he concentrated. His cane was left in the apartment when he came out to find some money.

Phantom thought of something else to deal with his cards instead. He remembered seeing many kinds of deceptions for escape, most popular probably being the typical attention-diversion trick. That could work in this case, but of course, Phantom is one proud gentleman. As one, he felt like he should take this to a next level instead of blindly following the norm.

With two fingers, Phantom secretly took out a piece of card from his pocket. Knowing the direction of the apartment and secretly hoping that the laws of physics in this world were the same as those in the Maple World, he tossed his card upwards at the slight lack of attention on him. Without further ado, Phantom pointed to his card and yelled, "Hey look, flying card!"

"What? Where?" Before long, the two cops caught a glance of the strange, swift flying object that seemed to blew past them upwards. Within the short span of turning of heads, Phantom darted away as fast as possible.

"Hey! He's escaping!" one yelled behind him as he raced back towards the crowd. He had absolutely no time to look behind. Fortunately, the mob had yet to dissipate, and Phantom soon found himself half-squeezing through the crowd, catching a few Ouches, Ow-s, Oi-s, What-the-s, and Watch-where-you're-going-s.

Phantom turned around the corner of a building and slowed down, returning to the status of an ordinary person walking on the streets. Amongst the crowd, he heard faint voices of the two cops behind.

"He's gone!" said one.

"He couldn't have gone far. Search around," the other spoke.

Phantom sighed, this time a breath of relief. He still quickened his pace, and left the place as quickly and as poker-faced as possible lest he met with more trouble. Fortunately, he met with no obstacle on his way back to the apartment.

"Oh, you're back," Luminous spoke as Phantom stepped in the doorway. "How did it go out there?"

"Not quite smooth," said Phantom, still panting, "a few bumps here and there, but managed to survived."

"So, you got some money you said you're going to?" asked Luminous.

Phantom said nothing, instead taking out the wad of bills from his pocket and proudly whopped it on the coffee table.

"This much I got, could last us for a few weeks here."

Luminous frowned and asked, "You didn't run into any trouble did you?"

"I don't know, maybe I did. 'Tis a wonder that a piece of card can do so much," Phantom looked out of the apartment barricades.

"Err, Phantom, I don't mean to disappoint you but…"

"Oh look, it's back," Phantom interrupted.

A piece of card swiftly flew between the apartment blocks like an eagle. A slight gust of wind changed its course and it headed towards their direction. Phantom reached out his hand and caught the card with two fingers.

"You've done it again, mate," Phantom spoke to the card and placed it back in his pocket.

"Whoa!" the sound of a girl gasped near them, "How did you do that?!"

"Hey Nami," Luminous called out, "don't feel surprised, he does that all the time."

"But that's literally impossible! We are at the tenth floor! I mean, wow, just wow!" Nami stepped in, still unable to believe Phantom's ability.

"Err, and Phantom, I don't mean to disappoint you…" Luminous spoke again, but Phantom wasn't listening.

"'Tis simple once you learned it, thankfully things work the way it does in the Maple World, so I could pull that out," he said to Nami.

"Phantom, I don't…" Luminous tried to speak again.

"What's all the commotion out there?" Checky came out of the bedroom. "Oh hey, welcome back Nami," he said when he saw Nami.

"Hey Checky, Phantom said he got three thousand for us. Think you should tell him?" asked Luminous, "I tried. Interrupted."

"You tell him, not me!" Checky said, half-pleading, half-demanding.

"Alright then Phantom, I have something to tell you," Luminous hesitated, clearing his throat before continuing, "While you were out there, stirring up trouble for these money you got, or maybe not, Checky went out too, and in only like, 15 minutes got one thousand back safe and sound. And you came back more than 2 hours after that. So, I was gonna tell you that you could have saved all the trouble you would have otherwise caused out there."

Phantom was just about to brag about the difference in values when Checky spoke first, "And fyi, I still have about sixty thousand dollars left in my savings account here. Used to be a travelling mascot for more than fifteen years, had to go round the world for those years before settling back in Edelstein to help out. For ease of expense, I opened a bank account in every country I travelled. ATM works wonders, you know?" He proudly flashed out a shiny card with a small golden chip on it.

Checky continued, "Even before you went out, Phantom, I tried to tell you to save your strength. Too bad, you were gone before I could say anything. About the food, I bought it on the way back, Luminous and I ate it. We decided to save some for you but I ate it because it went cold."

"Oh…" Phantom felt his heart sank to the ground floor. He instantly felt defeated. "I probably am wanted in this world now…" said Phantom before retreating to his room, with Nami staring blankly at him, confused at the situation.

"Bingo," whispered Checky to Luminous.

"About what?"

"The trouble part."

"Oh by the way, I bought lunch for everyone," Nami spoke up, trying to compensate for the lack of breakfast.

"You're back quite early today, Nami," said Checky.

"Well, I work half-day on Saturdays, don't you remember?"

"Hey Phantom, you got lucky. Nami bought food for us," Phantom heard Luminous calling out.

Phantom hadn't felt like going out yet. He didn't feel quite exhausted, but thought a rest is needed for him to chill out. His hunger had strangely diminished, even though he hadn't had any food.

He plopped down and tried to stay comfortable on the mattress, but couldn't quite do so. He got up and tried to practise with his cane and cards. Magic works not, and his cane kept dropping for some reason while he was spinning it, so he laid down on the bed again. His mind could not stop thinking about his hurt pride, and Checky's words.

"Wait a minute," something came over him, "Checky did say he came to this world before returning to Edelstein. If he really does, how did he travel to and fro?"

Phantom thought about it over and over again. Before long, he drifted off to sleep.

Checky looked at the list again as he ate. Luminous was still chatting with Nami.

There seemed to be something he had missed. As he looked at the fifteen names, there seemed to be something irregular about it. It took him some time to realise that the irregularities were caused by the light, which revealed the scribblings behind the paper. "That was stupid of me to not check the back side all the while," he thought. And so he did.

He saw the new set of names, much to his horror. There were seven of them, besides the fifteen at the front side. He could not believe his eyes.

"Nami, these are the complete list of vanished characters?" he asked to confirm.

"Err yeah, I checked with the game and the forums, this is the complete list."

Checky looked at the seven names again. The thought of finding the remaining twelve people had already stressed him out, and now there were seven more names.

Worst of all, none of the seven names were his allies.

Phantom wandered through a realm of darkness. All was black in this realm. The ground he walked on was invisible, but each footsteps he made on the ground glowed rather faintly.

He proceeded to walk on, and in a distance he thought he saw a familiar sight, glowing faintly. As he neared the being, he started to recognise it.

"Aria!" Phantom said to himself. He quickened his pace, wanting to get near to her as quickly as possible. He had been missing her dearly, and the hope of reunion seemed possible at the very moment.

He approached her while calling out her name a few times. Aria was floating in mid air, wearing the same dress as the one she wore during her death, looking peaceful and beautiful as ever. Her eyes were closed, however.

Phantom called out to her again and tried to reach for her hand. At the moment his fingers wrapped around her hand, Aria slowly opened her eyes. They glowed very radiantly.

Aria started to speak. Her voice sounded the same as before, but it echoed as though a few other Arias were also speaking at the same time.

"Deep beyond the maple's reaches,
Thereforth lies a universe of alternate.
'Tis similar in a way of logic,
Yet difference be devoid of sense.
In such a place forth, enchantments an' sorceries
Doth hath themselves permanently seal'd,
In place of them science an' technology,
Wild beyond the intelligence of magic,
An' henceforth pronounced "the reality".
The creation of the maple, the dimension of magic,
Art but the works of such a universe
Where intelligence of minds triumphs much levels.
As beckon'd by difference of nonsense,
The reality dost hath maple forbid'n,
As doth the maple prohibit reality.
Entrance art impossible not, ne'er the less.
Such permission art gladly grant'd,
By respective time, light, life, of which
Rules of logic art compel'd to be met.
Should such conditions be fail'd to adhere,
He who crosses shalt find himself
Trap'd between, a void of limbo."

As she finished the last sentence, Aria's body started to glow brighter and brighter, until Phantom could hardly see her at all.

"Aria? Aria!" Phantom screamed, but all around him was too bright. Suddenly, the glow died down and everything vanished. The next thing he knew, he was sitting on his bed. Checky and Luminous were snoring away just beside him.

'A dream. Aria has something to tell me,' Phantom thought as he woke from his bed.