In order to unlock the other three missions here, we're going to have to go on a bit of a trek first. Ride a chocobo all the way through Aggra's Pasture (where you fought Neochu) and into the Haerii Archaeopolis. Right at the entrance you will find a save point and the Cie'th Stone for mission 30, with a paling blocking the way forward. The mark is back in the Mah'habara Subterra, but in a secret section that we haven't visited yet. To get there, teleport to Sulyya Springs and ride the Atomos, it will bridge a gap that you couldn't cross earlier. The path down here branches off early, with one way leading to a Cie'th Stone that we'll be coming back for later. I'll go back to the main story style of listing every battle for this section to make sure you don't waste your time going the wrong way. If you see something different from the enemy groupings I list, you took the wrong fork.
Mah'habara Subterra- Secret Area[]
When you get off the Atomos, you will be very close to the Waystone we unlocked on the last page. Obviously you want to go in the opposite direction, we've thoroughly explored that side of the cave.
Battle- Yaksha x 2 This is the fork in the road, jump down to the right.
Battle- Yaksha x 2 After you pass them, watch your mini-map for a little side area on the right, it holds a Moogle Puppet which you can sell for 18,000 Gil.
Battle- Yaksha x 2, Yakshini I should mention that the enemies here don't give very many CP, and most of them can be avoided with some fancy footwork if you want to save time. The path splits here again, but it doesn't matter which side of the circle you go around.
Battle- Strigoi There will be 3 of these in a row, all can be easily avoided or preempted. When the paths join back up, pick up the Pervoskite on the way through.
Battle- Vetala
Battle- Strigoi x 2 Make use of the save point behind them, you get a ton of time for the next battle but if you somehow don't get 5 stars that's a hell of a long walk back to the mission stone.
Mission 30- Syphax, the Insidious[]
Once again, the standard random battle setup will be more than sufficient for all the battles on this page.
Syphax won't show up until you've killed off a few of his Numidia henchmen, so use Aggression and blow them away with Blitz/ Ruinga. They'll drop very quickly, so keep an eye out for the big guy and switch to Smart Bomb as soon as he appears. Make sure you don't let Fang target the little ones, you want to stay focused on the mark at all times. When he staggers go to Relentless Assault unless you haven't gotten Deprotect up yet, in which case you obviously want Ruthless. Between Ruinga and multi-target spells, I finished off all the Numidias with the splash damage, so I switched to Aggression to finish him off. Since he was staggered, I interrupted all of his moves which prevented him from calling more. I wonder just how many Numidias they expect you to kill to make the target time that freakin' high?
Haerii Archaeopolis[]
After the battle, search the dead end for two treasure spheres holding 4 Perfect Conductors and 2 Particle Accelerators. Now go all the way back past the Atomos and warp/ ride all the way back to the Archaeopolis. If only there were a Waystone there.... We're going to spend more than five seconds here this time, there are three treasure spheres, two missions to complete, and another one to accept. When you enter the city, stay along the wall on your right hand side and follow it to a ruined building. Go past or through the 3 Strigoi and make your way around the rubble to get underneath, where you will run into a Cactuar. There is a hole in the floor here, and a Collector's Catalog is at the bottom. Jump back out and go on top of the building and off the other side, you should see a treasure sphere with a winged Cie'th flying around it. Defeat the Pijavica and the 9 Fractured Horns will be yours for the taking. Keep going along that outside edge and duck underneath another pile of rubble to find 3 Seekers and a Strigoi guarding a Witch's Bracelet. Now that we're done lootingtreasure hunting, accept the Waystone mission in the corner. Don't worry, this is a much shorter walk.
He is joined by 3 Seekers, and you can use them to your advantage by luring them out and then hitting for a preemptive strike when they try to go back to their starting point. Go with Relentless Assault and focus on the mark while hammering the Seekers with the area damage. Just like last time, if you try to fight this thing head on you might not even be able to stagger him within the target time, let alone finish the battle.
Mission 34- Zenobia, the Butcher[]
Wow, two Undying on one page. This is the red stone near the Waystone, it will unlock the Faultwarrens and Titan's Trials. When you approach the red dot on your map, you will see a cool little scene where a Tonberry swoops in and poaches your kill. If that little bastard thinks he's claiming the reward for this hunt, he's got another thing coming.
First of all, you can pretty much forget about the clock here, because they give you a ridiculous amount of time to kill Tonberries. Go make yourself a sandwich, get a drink, whatever, when you come back you can still finish the battle and get 5 stars. The only problem is, as the battle goes on the Tonberry uses increasing Grudge levels to become more and more powerful. This won't be an issue here, but can be in a later mission when you fight three of them. Start this battle with Smart Bomb to get Deprotect, Deshell, Imperil, and Slow; then switch to Ruthless so Vanille can hit with Poison. At this point you can go to Aggression since his chain should be fairly high and his HP around half. Two or three rounds of that and he's toast. If you struggle for some reason, you can make Vanille the lead and have both her and Fang as Saboteurs, with Light as a Medic or better yet Sazh as a Synergist. Fang will use Daze to put him to sleep, and with all those debuffs Vanille will have a high probability of hitting with Death, should be around 1/14 chance. With Haste, that won't take long at all, but you will have to live with the knowledge that you are a cheating bastard.
By the way, if you retry this mission you will see that same cut-scene every time, which makes absolutely no sense.
Side Trip[]
Before you move on to the next mark, take one step into the Faultwarrens (you'll see "Truthseeker's Rise" at the bottom corner of the screen), this unlocks a very useful mission that you may want to repeat later on for big CP and a good amount of cash. We'll do it for the first time on the next page, for now there is one more stone back in the Archaeopolis. Accept mission 33, then make your way to the Archylte Steppe's Eastern Tors. Along the way, you might want to fight the Ochu in Aggra's Pasture so you can use Libra on it, that will save you the trouble of doing it when you fight one as a mission later.
Mission 33- A Parent's Pledge[]
That Cie'th Stone was depressing, I almost feel bad about killing this thing now. Oh well, what are you gonna do?
You should have fought a couple of these already, but just in case I'll give a few tips. Run up the chain with Smart Bomb and make sure you get Slow and Deprotect on him, then when he staggers go to Aggression for the kill. By now you should be able to finish this battle without even using a healing paradigm once, but if you do you should go with Tireless Charge because I'm sure he will be staggered by that point.
Be Careful What You Wish For[]
I'm sure some of you out there are hoping for some difficult marks, your wish will be granted on the next page.
