Today we start our dive into the world of sidequests, oddly all best left until after the main story of the game. Well theres nothing that I, Cymbleine can do about it. Well at least I can complain, but then again that never usually works so...On to Part 20!
Mark Missions (AKA: The Only Sidequest in this Entire Game)[]
Lets see where did we leave off...Oh yeah! We defeated Orphan and destroyed the world, but somehow we're back on Cocoon and in Orphan's Cradle. Well if anything good came from those final battles its that we've gotten another Crystarium level to explore, in fact its the final one we will ever recieve. This is when the boosts are really noticable, you can also get a fourth accessory slot and I believe every character will have well over 10,000 HP. But enough of that, lets go on with hunting! I do enjoy killing things.
So the first thing your going to want to do is turn around and head back to the enterance of Orphan's Cradle. Then you want to take the path to your right to return to Gran Pulse. This is where all the marks take place, thus this is where you want to be.
You'll be back at base camp, and you want to go to the Steppe, because this is where the first missions take place. Activate the Cie'th Stone from the tutorial about them back from Chapter 11 and accept to hunt the first mark of our sidequesting: Ectopudding. To find your mark either use your map and head for the pink star of head in the direction of Cocoon and you should see him. He doesn't move so getting a preemptive strike is really easy.
The next Cie'th Stone appears right next to you. Activate it and you can find the Mark: Uridimmu by using your map (If you must know, he's to the south eastish of the stone, along the wall.
The next Stone will right next to the where the mark was again. The next mark is found in the Yachas Massif. Oh and before I forget now's a good of time as any to develope your characters in their final Crystarium levels. I went for Ravager with Vanille, Commando with Fang, and Ravager with Hope. Oh yeah and Vanille her Magic +100 accessories back because you won't be needing Death resistance anytime soon. Anyways on to the Mark: (Save before challenging him because you may not be able to beat the target time.) Oh and if you lure him out and run out of his eyesight he will turn around and you can eaisily Preemptive Strike him.
The next Stone we're looking for is on the way to the Paddrean Archaeopolis, and is marked by a blinking orange circle on the mini-map. The mark is also on your way there so when your ready face them. (If you need help use your Map)
The next Stone is behind where we are, on the lower path by the Save Station. The mark is located higher up in the area with the Behemoth Kings. (Again use your map, they gave you one for a reason.)
The next Cie'th Stone is all the way on the other side of this area, right before the destroyed city. The mark is located behind you in the Pass of Padda.
With that we have opened up another teleport stone. That means we can now use the stone by Paddra to warp to the stone up near the enterance of this area, and vice versa. Now return to Paddra, because our next mark is a stone located in the city itself. When you acitvate the stone, you get a scene where the mark: Bituitus, The Pillager flies into the city. The city is now emptied out and as you try to leave you get attacked by our next mark, and the first of the Undying.
Page Overload[]
You know you've overloaded the page when every thing you type cone at a rate of one letter a second, so I'll cover the rest of the Marks here to speed up the process.
When he bites the dust, Bituitus will go insane and fly around a bit before turning into a cocoon. Maybe someday when enough time passes, he will be a beautiful butterfly, but that will have to wait. The next Mark can be found way back in the Vallis Media, by our old Base Camp. This stone is another of the teleport stones, so this mission is really worth doing. The mark itself is located by the place where you found Hope.
With that done you've opened up a new teleport stone. The eaisies way to get to where we want to go, the Archylte Steppe, is to go up to the Yaschas Massif and teleport back down to Base Camp and head the rest of the way there. Once your back on the Steppe, head through the "tunnel" area and look to your left for the next stone, which turns out to be yet another Teleport Stone. 4 in one sitting, pretty neat I guess. The Kaiser Behemoth is found by the pond where we fought the Ectopudding.
One more left on this page, then I move on to better things. The next stone is down towards the rocks across from the lake, heading away from Cocoon. The mark itself is all the way down just before the enterance to Mahabara.
And with that I'm done with this page. See you around!