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Eternal X Tour of Duty Lost Episode 2
Posted By: Lion O CyborgDate: 12/1/20 5:00 a.m.

Eternal X Tour of Duty Lost Episode 2

Forward: This Lost Episode covers Chapter 3. Next to Chapter 4, this is one of the ones with the most text and/or images I pinched from myself to use as notes for the main Tour entry, supporting VBB's coverage with things he missed or didn't know about. The cargo conveyor belt is the most prominent example. I also copied the whole of act 1 into VBB & I's email corrosponence to help him beat it as this level was quite hard and even I only remembered it in patches. The lava waterslide later and the sneaky hidden switch nearby both got us when we were writing our respective parts.

Chapter 3: Prophecy Stage 2: Crisis Galaxy

Act 1: Eat S’pht and Die

Last time on Tour of Duty, we travelled back in time to the distant past chasing after Hathor and were conscripted by past S’bhuth into helping the S’pht Kr depart Lh’owon. He put us on ice for a thousand Lh’owon years (Earth calendar time unknown) and we woke up just as the Pfhor invaded.

I managed to flood the Citadel of Antiquity’s lava moats and seal the entrance and windows. Now the surviving S’pht intend me to distract the lizards with a massacre of their forces, buying time for the S’pht to either reach Thoth’s activation sites and/or the swamp ansible complex which the ‘Kr’s riddle directed us to in Marathon 2.

They’ve sent us to a Jjaro complex in an active volcano that the Pfhor are attacking. Time to make some noise.

Cool! It’s raining fire! Well, sort of.

Shining Raven’s rain script works well again here too: the volcano is erupting, blocking out the night sky and making it snow ash. West of the teleporter at the start is a small passage to an area with a large square footing, a pair of magma falls in alcoves and a chip slot. Purple S’pht Defenders (clan unknown) help me fight some F’lickta, troopers and Spec Ops hunters.

There’s virus ticks here too, which are hostile to everyone not of Lh’owon. You can hear them calling out to each other in the night. (All ticks friendly and otherwise use loon owl sounds, which is how I interpreted those sounds back in Marathon 2)

A large blast shutter shields a portion of the volcano so I take the north branch of the passage I came in from to a basement with blue shock absorbers. From there, a winding passage leads up a lift to a courtyard full of clay f’lickta, major hunters and enforcers, some with scatter rifles, most with plasma flamethrowers.

I recommend the scatter and havok rifles for this area as it’s a bit difficult. There’s a switch behind the lava pond’s sluiceway that opens a small door next to it, but there’s nothing inside. A lift to the perimeter walkway is beside the entrance, but the switch doesn’t work. One of the sluice supports has a lift to another switch that enables the aforementioned walkway lift switch. I need to swivel around a pair of walls blocking the walkway in order to reach the tunnel section.

I follow it and jump a gap to a second tunnel with some tick corpses to a large teleporter containing the chip for the blast door on a pedestal. Taking it lowers another shutter into that very room.

Why are they here? They should be hiding! All for nought as a Spec Ops hunter, fighters and a juggernaut spawn in. Luckily, there’s a 2X shield terminal on my left. I also learned from watching the ASE Podcast stream that the fusion rifle’s charged shots are how we deal with Jugs for now. A cyan Defender (Mnr or Lhar?) assists in destroying the tank.

Quick knee usage gets me through a door to my right with only some burnt toes, but I still have to swim to reach the elevator on the other side, past more S’pht corals. The ledge above takes me past some switch and automatic doors to a pattern buffer and from there to a dead end overlooking one of the volcano’s vents, supported with a metallic fountain housing.

One nearby lever doesn’t work for now and I don’t know what the other one does, so I decide to jump to the doorway on the south side of the vent. Inside is another purple shield terminal and a lever. You need the shields to survive the swim back to the start and walkway again. A coral cuts in front of me as I climb onto the lift. How rude! Jumping doesn’t get me over his head either.

The vent lever activated the walkway one; they seem to open stairs by the dead end. At the top is a sluiceway with a locked door behind it with a S’pht coral milling about. Past the shutter near him is a flame flume.

Some virus ticks try to feed as I save at the pattern buffer on the right ledge, wiping out my shields. Next to them is a tall area with a column in the middle and a blue fighter on the opposite ledge. Below are some F’lickta and the north entrance to the shock absorber basement. The column has a panel on it that doesn’t open yet and the lava slide leads back to the start.

Turns out I had to go around the first sluice and flip a lever to open the first locked door. Past it are some ticks, a dead S’pht and a lava fountain.

The shutter next to it goes to a teleporter in the fighter window overlooking the column pit by the shock absorbers. I charge up my shields fully before I leave, using strategic jumping to return to where I was. Based on 1.0 and 1.1, I have a feeling I’ll need them. I also find there were circuits behind the now open panel in the column, which I must have smashed earlier as I’d hit the panel with the staff.

Act 2: Second to Last of the Mohicans – Forge of Hours

“drictelt 0906” aaron ”’|8-’|9” Raven 19 Also, the original map text in the original Eternal X says “Why can’t I all this?! Boohoohoo!”

I’ve been looking forward to this map in particular for 1.2. When I was in the chat for the Rampancy.net Halo 2 Anniversary stream, I mentioned during the energy conveyor belt section in the Arbiter that Aleph One seriously needed conveyor belts like Halo 2 and other 2.5D shooters like Marathon (starting with Build engine games). Infinity at least had conveyors but they were just animated textures with no behaviour so they did nothing.

In both main older versions, this map had a cargo conveyor belt in it (some sort of factory or mine?) but you couldn’t reach it, as it was impossible to ride it. During that part of the chat, Shining Raven informed me that she had actually made the conveyor belt on the 1.2 version of the map not only accessible, but functional too. That is one of the best upgrades to Eternal X Omega 1.2 besides the rain script, geometry and texture updates.

https://youtu.be/GM_ZUo7L4kw?t=1294 Check the chat around here.

Speaking of rain, I teleport into the sky by this supposed mining complex during a thunderstorm.

According to the rain script after splitting the WAD into individual maps, the rain here is supposed to be nuclear fallout. Taking shelter in the tower, I check the terminal.

The lever next to the computer opens the mine entrance, but it would be wise to turn it off to hold the door open.

Now, this map was originally a success plank map in 1.0. Leela sent us here for some reason or another. By Eternal X Omega 1.1, it’s now a failure plank map: this one and Flames of Icarus swapped places. Flame of Icarus in Omega 1.2 is now is a tad more faithful to the original map, necessitating a title change but hold on, we’ll get to that.

Inside the mine door is a very tall staircase to a junction, the north door is locked but the west one goes past a scatter rifle enforcer and some fighters whom I toast and down a skybridge to the upper level of the tower, where I find a switch for the lower of the two balconies and a save terminal.

The tanks never used to be there. I hope they’re just parked. Going back to the main complex and reaching the balcony, I find they are very much manned.

The main mining complex consists of a maze of windowed rooms similar to the smaller ones in the Citadel bunkers, only made of techno gems and full of hunters as well as some civilian S’pht. Killing the first two hunters, the first one’s body gets lodged in the door then the door eats it. OK… That bug was in the trilogy too; I guess Bungie didn’t think of Duke Nukem 3D’s method of leaving a bloody string of meat, like the cheese in a good pizza or 5-guys burger. It wouldn’t have been a priority anyway.

The western part of the gem junctions has a switch for a door in the cargo bay ahead plus the first view of the cargo belt, now with chaselights!

I find this very soothing. If anyone makes a map taking place in an aquatic base or underwater aquarium like Deep Sea World by the south river, I’d love to see a shark and jellyfish tank belt section with this kind of lighting.

The cargo bay has a bunch of dead S’pht in it as well as a trooper and Spec Ops hunter. The warehouse door is partially open but you cannot get through and there’s nothing out there. East of the cargo bay is a pair of empty rooms and a shield charger by another window into the conveyor belt, guarded by a couple of scatter rifle enforcers. This is very useful as there’s only a health station before this.

There’s a switch through the only closed door here that opens the loading area for the cargo conveyor belt. I use the staff on the pfhor in here, making sure to spam both attacks on the spec ops hunter while carefully stepping back out of its punching range.

Lia told me about those drones too in the Halo 2 Anniversary stream chat (I think?) so this should be fun. Unfortunately, the door doesn’t open yet so after saving, I use a lever on the east side of the belt to open some red metal stairs guarded by enforcers of both flavours. The red hall goes under the junctions above to a gold hall with gold techno stones in a small depression in the floor. There’s a hunter in the warehouse behind the door by the stones, plus some troopers behind the closed blast shutter.

The door next to the shutter is locked so I head to the other end of the gold hall. To the west is a staircase made of what looks like wood and a floor made of grey techno gems/stones.

I hear the distinct sounds of lava bubbling and sure enough, the automap reveals a pool of what must be magma (as opposed to the glass at the citadel) lava to the east. A lever upstairs opens a warehouse blast shutter to a second tower yard, revealing a juggernaut tank parked on a balcony. The other door in the gold hall leads to the warehouse. There’s a large stack of ornately carved gold ingots, some quarried stone and a denim crate with a white light on the side. A hunter and an enforcer attack through the shutter. This time I don’t foolishly bump into or shoot the tanks.

A nearby lever opens the locked door in the other half of the warehouse, so I head back there. Past some stone and a lapis lazuli block carved similarly to the gold, I find a blue techno gem staircase with troopers at the bottom.

More pfhor attack in the tower yard and I get caught in the spec ops hunter’s death explosion. One reload later, I try again without grenade spamming this time. The switch in the tower opens the next part of the mine by the warehouse upstairs.

Up the stairs through that door, I cut across the second balcony to a pattern buffer. A lever up the stairs to the left arranges some more stairs in another room. The stairs down lead back to the mine entrance where the door ate the hunter corpse. The elevator stairs up go to two doors. The one that isn’t locked leads to some fighters and an enforcer guarding some S’pht corals. A red gemstone door heads over a skybridge to the second tower where I find a switch for the second balcony door.

There’s a terminal on a stone block in here. I don’t remember seeing it before. It seems to just be a label on a crate as it doesn’t work. Continuing on, I find an oxygen terminal by the conveyor belt.

Down some stairs I find a ruby and gold coated room with tough pfhor in it, which warrants several trips back to the green shield terminal. East of here is a junction hall of with a shield terminal and two switches.

West is a gold cargo bay with a half open door. The door here leads back to the really tall stairs by the first tower yard. The far northeast has a shield terminal and a switch that opens a door into the receiving room at the end of the conveyor belt.

Reading this terminal opens the conveyor belt umbilical. At last! Conveyor belts in Marathon!

https://youtu.be/U7Gr-sDUPIE?t=1173

They seem to be faked with a barely hidden layer of water, going by the automap but I don’t care. Hat’s off to Liacrow/Shining Raven for upgrading this map so. Other map makers better be talking notes. I want to see more conveyors in the future e.g. factory levels, starports etc.

Crouch controls to go with my jump script too, so air vents of more realistic size (not too realistic or we wouldn’t fit) or narrow caves to be made, enhancing maps further.

There’s circuit panels to smash but even doing that, I take the slow way back, savouring every picosecond. The belt is too slow though: it outruns me as I ride it but again, I happy enough just to have it. The panel I break opens the belt’s loading hatch back at the start.

What is this magma tank above the conveyor belt for? Is this mining complex harvesting lava and other minerals from the volcano I was at in the last map?

What is the little channel or track on the end of the belt for? It looks like it receives cargo and carries it into the teleporter at the end for beaming elsewhere, like processing I guess.

I had to get those too. This hall of mirrors glitch makes me think of the infinity well illusion at the Satrosphere science museum down at the beach. I find out that I must kill all the pfhor to leave, so I backtrack up the conveyor belt again and use charged fusion rifle blasts to deal with the tanks.

I was not expecting the parked ones to have downed shields so my first blow wipes out my shield and incinerates me down to around 4 health. It doesn’t help that I bit my tongue in surprise (not IRL). If I took off my armour I’d get arrested for racial insensitivity.

Scraping off the burnt skin with a fish slice spatula and using the shield terminal to treat the reddish marsh underneath, I deal with the tanks in the other tower yard also.

Thoth has indeed been activated by the S’pht. What does he mean, “a time far too new”? He can help call for the S’pht Kr and save their species! They won’t have to be enslaved, they can weaken the Pfhor early! They can…I am cut off in my writings as I feel the space-time rift of my Electric Sheep device/Cybernetic Junction activate, whisking me somewhere unknown.

Act 3: The Manipulated Dead - I Need TP For My Bunghole

It should come as no surprise: no matter where I go, when I come back here it’s all ruins.

The horrible otherworldly screams echo through the station. While it is meant to be the ship creaking from age as revealed in the sound file, I know it better as something else. A dead body lies around the corner behind me though to call it a body is a little too generous. It’s more of a deep puddle. This is the future world, far removed from my own era. Why did it turn out this way?

WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?! There is no mistaking it. That’s what the W’rkncacnter sounds like! I JUST SPOKE TO THE MOTHERFUCKING W’RKNCACNTER! I did not expect something like this at all. Th-This is terrible! According to what it says, after I helped the S’pht awaken Thoth and recall the S’pht Kr, they managed to repel the Pfhor, but in response they fired the Trih Xeem and freed the very dreaming god I helped seal a second time in the present!

I was supposed to have died there too! If I don’t return quick, the Pfhor will fire their little doctor again and everything will die.

Like Yrro’s terraforming station around Lh’owon, the halls of Inti Station by Sol are silent and empty. The only people around are bloody husks of shredded meat lining the corners. To think this is what our future looks like. I find an overshield chip up the small lift.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGHHHHH…!

Yes, not only is the W’rkncacnter free again, but now it actually spawns its ayakashi, which as we learned in my Pathways into Darkness Tour of Duty, are monsters created as living manifestations of its own nightmares. Like Pathways into Darkness they constantly respawn, in all previous versions of Eternal X, NOTHING we have at this point can kill them. You can only run. But there’s no escape; they WILL catch you, which means dying and reloading A LOT. This map should have instead been called “I Need TP for My Bunghole”.

In Eternal X Omega 1.2, the banshees are weak to fusion shots and according to Liacrow, the plasma flamethrower too. This is why I warned you all to save your ammo for this point.

What are those clip things?

What happened here? Did the W’rkncacnter itself do this or did the banshees get them? As I fight the spectres here, I see reality itself glitch outside the window by the airlock. More shades will attack here if given the chance but there is room to move around. Be careful; the banshees can and will hit the hanger door switches and expose the station to vacuum. Any more outside will then have a way in.

After I open the door to the exit terminal, I find that the door I used to take past the shield terminal is locked. I have to backtrack through the other hanger.

Those squares of light by the stars warp around as I look at them. The glitches I spoke of earlier in the hanger were not part an in-universe thing only; there’s hall of mirrors glitches if you look out the window by the airlock a certain way, namely if you view it from the far end. I like to think that’s part of the W’rk’s effects on the universe. “Sense?” It might say in more discordant characters like the terminal. “What fun is there in making sense?”

Contrary to what you’d think, Durandal is less than pleased and present Thoth just as much as his past self.

Just don’t, Durandal. Causality be damned, I saved the S’pht from the Pfhor when they were supposed to be first enslaved and THIS is how you and Thoth repay me? Ungrateful bastards! Even though the Pfhor used the Trih Xeem, I could have just done as I did in Infinity and stopped it millennia in the past. The only reason I’m here is because either you two or past Thoth sent me to the future world against my will! Leela could have found me and helped me steal a pfhor ship to reach the terraforming platform from Aye Mak Sicur. As it stands, the W’rkncacnter Trigger did its job, assuming Hathor’s little name for the Pfhor to get me to go on her mission still applies after she revealed her true colors.

So I am sent back to S’pht Happens. This time I need to find Leela. Be sure to read the main tour entry as well and also Chapter 3 Stage 3 following them both: http://forums.bungie.org/story/?noframes;read=73068

http://forums.bungie.org/story/?noframes;read=73078

Stay tuned for Lost Episode 3 and Chapter 3 Stage 3! Don't miss it!

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Eternal X Tour of Duty Lost Episode 2Lion O Cyborg 12/1/20 5:00 a.m.
     Re: Eternal X Tour of Duty Lost Episode 2VikingBoyBilly 12/3/20 3:49 p.m.

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