Old Town can make a simple errand feel oddly confusing. Celeste sends you to Santa Maria Houses for Digging Up Dirt, but the dead drop is not sitting behind a street-level door. Before heading out, it helps to keep your kit light and save space for useful ARC Raiders Items you might pick up along the way. This job opens after Tribute to Toledo and takes place on Buried City. The key is to stop treating the marked building like a normal house. You need to get above it first.
What to look for around Santa Maria Houses
- Head into Old Town and reach the Santa Maria Houses marker
- Use the rooftops north of the building instead of circling the front doors
- Keep the yellow bell tower in view, then move toward the nearby pink section
- Find the upper opening, ride the interior zipline down, and check the fountain
A lot of players lose time because "courtyard" sounds like it should be outside. It is not. The right courtyard is tucked inside the building and filled with sand, so you will not spot it while running around the alleys. Once you are on the roof, look for an open hatch, window, or broken upper entrance. Drop in, then follow the interior route downward. There is usually a wall opening after the descent. Go through it and you will reach the small enclosed courtyard. The dead drop is at the fountain near the middle, not in a loot crate off to one side.
Do the interaction before you start poking through rooms. That sounds obvious, but it is easy to get distracted when you hear a container nearby or spot materials on a shelf. Santa Maria Houses is also a common stop for other Raiders, and the roof route leaves you exposed. Pause before crossing a walkway. Listen for gunfire, footsteps, and ARC movement. If someone is already fighting inside, you do not always need to join in. Slip through when there is an opening, hit the fountain, and check that the quest tracker actually changes. Just reaching the courtyard does not count.
You do not need to carry a special quest object out of the raid once the dead drop has been opened. That takes some pressure off, especially if the area turns messy afterwards. Still, a clean extraction is nice if you have gathered components or other supplies. Digging Up Dirt rewards Advanced Electrical Components and Speaker Components, while also leading toward Turnabout and Apollo's Building a Library. If you are expecting trouble on the approach, it can be sensible to buy ARC Raiders Weapons that suit quick rooftop fights, then keep moving instead of trying to own the whole neighbourhood.
