Destiny 2 Story so far: Lightfall Edition

by | Apr 6, 2023

Our end approaches. The Witness and their Black Fleet stand poised to finish what they started. The Second Collapse, a whirlwind of calamity and destruction.

The Traveler stands vigilant above our planet, prepared to meet the oncoming threat. Our Warmind is gone. Our Phoenix, lightless. But how did we get here?

Let’s take a look back at the interwoven narrative of Destiny 2, going back to The Witch Queen expansion. We’ll focus on the most important details necessary to understand our position going into Lightfall.

The Great Deception

Before The Witch Queen expansion, Savathun had taken control of Osiris’ body and used it to infiltrate the Last City. She averted all suspicion and spent the year gathering information and planting seeds of discourse.

Eventually, the charade was dropped. Savathun reveals herself to us and the Awoken Queen, Mara Sov. The two queens come to an agreement: should we help remove her worm from her, Savathun will return Osiris to us. Seeing this as an opportunity to slay the hive god once and for all, Mara Sov and the guardians agree. The season ends with the exorcism enacted successfully; however, Mara is unable to eliminate Savathun before she escapes, leaving behind a comatose Osiris.

The Witch Queen: The Return of Mars

Upon landing, we witness the arrival of Savathun’s ship, The Lure. As we explore the ship, we defeat a Hive Knight wielding Void light, who is then resurrected by a Hive Ghost upon defeat. Somehow, the Hive have stolen the light from us.

Pursuing Savathun takes us to her Throne World. A pocket reality formed by her thoughts and paracausal power. A fight ensues, and though she appears beaten at first, she reveals her defeat to be another ruse. We are expelled from The Lure, landing and dying upon impact with the red planet’s surface.

Throughout the campaign, we gain access to a new power: Deepsight. The power to read psychic imprints of the past. Using this ability, we learn of an entity. The Voice in the Darkness. The Witness. It is “not darkness, but wears it like a cloak. It gives it a wicked shape”.

Savathun “refuses to be its servant”. We also learn of Savathuns plot: Use the power of the Witness, the power to move worlds, to offer the Traveler a safe haven from its enemies.

Finally, we witness the moment when Savathun gains the Light.

At last, the truth is revealed. Savathun never stole the Light. The Traveler chose to give the Light to her.

However, due to the nature of the Light, Savathun had no memory of her life before being Risen. Thus, she allowed us to walk through her Throne World freely, collecting artifacts and extracting memories from them. Now, she remembers.

As the campaign wraps up, Ikora takes a final artifact to the relic on Mars.

The Queen of Lies, deceived. The Witness had set into motion the events that would create the Hive.

Armed with this information, we set out to stop her. We use the information to confuse Savathun, allowing us to stop her ritual and free the Traveler. Savathun warns us of the arrival of the Witness before succumbing to her injuries.

Upon finishing the campaign, we are greeted by the first appearance of a threat wholly unlike anything we have ever seen. This is the Witness.

After the campaign, we also learn that Savathun was one of the reasons The Traveler survived the first Collapse. Using her cunning, she fooled The Witness into believing it had perished.

Shortly after, a team of guardians is tasked with entering the Dark Pyramid that was stranded in Savathun’s Throne World. Unlike other Pyramids we’ve encountered in the past, this one still had its occupant.

 

Rhulk Vow of the Disciple

Rhulk: The First Disciple

Upon approaching the Pyramid, we are contacted by an unknown creature named Rhulk. Six guardians venture within to eradicate this foe.

Rhulk, The First Disciple of the Witness, was charged with overseeing Savathun in her training to become a Disciple herself. When Savathun betrayed The Witness and claimed the Light, she trapped Rhulk within the sunken Pyramid. The raid team engages Rhulk in combat and defeats him.

The last words Rhulk speaks are a plea of forgiveness towards The Witness before violently exploding into strange, almost tree-like vines.

 

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Season of the Haunted: The Leviathan Returns

Callus, former Emperor of the Cabal and father to Empress Caiatl, has reappeared after his long absence. The last time we heard of him, he had attempted to commune with the Voice in the Darkness.  Now his ship, the Leviathan, has returned, overrun by a plant called Egregore and Nightmares.

Later on, it’s revealed Calus plans to take over the Pyramid and use it to become a Disciple. Since his introduction, Calus has always sought to be “the last”. He wishes to be the final spectator of creation and seeks to stand by The Witness as that end is ushered in.

At the end of the seasonal story, we are able to confront Calus in the Lunar Pyramid and face off against his nightmares one last time. A ritual is performed to sever his connection to the Pyramid, though Eris warns that this is only the beginning. The Calus we knew, the one Caitil knew, is gone. He has become something more. Something darker.

 

Season of Plunder art Destiny 2

Season of the Plunder: The Shipstealer Returns

Eramis has returned, set free by The Witness. Tasked with gathering strange relics, she calls to the old crews of Eliksni pirates to plunder the Sol System and seek out The Tombs of Nezarec. Though knowledge of what these artifacts are is kept from us early on in the season, eventually, we learn what lies within.

The Lunar Pyramid was not always without its commander. It originally belonged to Nezarec, a Disciple of the Witness. Eliksni butchered the remains of the disciple, wielding its parts as tokens of darkness. Eventually, the artifacts would be scattered across the Sol System.

Eventually, Mithrax and Eramis confront one another, and a battle ensues. Eramis lies defeated, but Mithrax spares her life, allowing her to escape.

With all the Tombs of Nezarec gathered, Mithrax is able to dilute them down to a tea. This dark ambrosia is given to Osiris, who has been in a comatose state since The Witch Queen discarded his lightless body. Upon receiving this dark elixir, Osiris awakens. His mind flooded with secrets he managed to steal from the Queen of Lies.

 

Destiny 2 Season of The Seraph featured

Season of the Seraph: Rasputin is back

While Ana Bray works to restore the Warmind AI, Rasputin, Osiris informs her of what he learned. After he was reawakened, he recalled something the Witch Queen sought to hide. A secret hidden on Neptune. He states that he needs Rasputin, as he is the greatest collection of Golden Age intelligence in the system.

Ana has been unable to restore Rasputin, but Osisirs proposes a solution: request aid from her grandfather Clovis Bray. Once a scientist in the Golden Age, he was gifted with a brilliant mind and a cruel soul. He was instrumental in designing the AI that would become Rasputin. He now dwells within a giant Exo Head on Europa.

Upon arrival to Europa, we learn Xivu Arath, Hive God of War and sister to Savathun, had sent her forces against Clovis. After rescuing Clovis, he accepts to help.

The plan is to gather data from Warmind facilities and use it to restore Rasputin. We also learn of Seraph Station, a space station orbiting Earth, from which Rasputin could take control of the Warsat Network and use it to launch an attack against Xivu Arath.

Ana comes up with a new plan: Put Rasputin back into his old Exo body to jumpstart his recovery.

The plan works, and Rasputin is reawakened. Able to speak to us directly, his first message is a warning. Clovis does not plan to upload Rasputin to the Warsat Network. Instead, he seeks to upload himself, becoming a machine god and humanity’s de facto protector. Learning this, Ana removes Clovis from the experimental Exo Frame, banishing him back to Europa.

Later on, Mara Sov reveals to us Xivu Arath’s true agenda. She plans to summon her armies above Earth, raining destruction down in the same manner as when she invaded the Cabal capital planet. War fuels her just as deception fueled Savathun. If we use Seraph Station to wipe her armies out, she would only grow stronger. If she manages to take control of Seraph Station, she would use it to decimate the Last City and grow stronger still. Mara states our only hope is a stalemate, a situation in which neither side uses Seraph Station.

 

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Aurora Sacrifice

Xivu Arath has begun her invasion of Seraph Station. There is no more time, and Rasputin informs us that as long as he exists, he will pose a danger to Earth. And thus, he chooses to sacrifice himself in order to protect Earth and the Traveler.

The Guardian boards Seraph Station while Empress Caiatl distracts Eramis’ forces. They meet Eramis on board, and engage in combat until she is able to escape. Rasputin is then uploaded to Seraph Station with mere moments to spare. And then…

Rasputin gives his life, his final act ensuring the protection of humanity one last time. The city looks up to see the Traveler standing vigil above Earth.

Rasputin has a final message recorded before his death. He tells us that what Osiris saw was real. A city on Neptune that the Witch Queen sought to conceal. It was home to the Veil, an object of immense paracausal power. One that is “linked to the Traveler”. This knowledge is his final gift to the Guardian and to humanity.

“Use it well, my Seraph. Humanity has no more need of a Warmind. Not when you have each other”

And with that, we are all caught up. The Black Fleet approaches, and the penultimate chapter of the Light and Darkness saga comes to a head. In Lightfall, we will head to Neptune and discover what the Veil truly is and why Savathun thought it so important to keep it hidden.

Written by Roxiee

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