It’s the Destiny 2 Ascendant Challenge, everyone! If you’ve played Destiny for a while now, you probably already know it. You might even know where this week’s challenge is! But maybe you need a refresher on where the very helpful Powerful Gear event is this week. The Dawning is on now, and you can get some good stuff for the holiday event, but that doesn’t mean you don’t want every last scrap of good gear you can get.
Every Ascendant Challenge shows off some of the most interesting new content in Forsaken, too. So you might as well head to the Dreaming City. As usual, the area is home to all sorts of secret portals and desperate Awoken soldiers. There’s more loot to earn than ever and, of course, a horrible case of Taken corruption.
This is just one Ascendant Challenge out of six, of course. Completing it will earn you Powerful Gear and exclusive Dreaming City cosmetics. You’ll want to enter the Ascendant Realm each week to make sure you get these potent rewards. Just make sure to find and speak with Petra Venj, first. She has the weekly Ascendant Challenge bounty you need for the better loot.
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Before You Start…
Before you can access any Ascendant Challenge, you need to drink a Tincture of Queensfoil. These items are rewarded randomly for a variety of activities in the Dreaming City: like completing public events, bounties, opening chests, and participating in the Blind Well.
Speaking of bounties, be sure to check where Petra Venj is this week. The weekly rewards from the challenges themselves are pretty paltry. You need to get the weekly “complete an Ascendant Challenge” bounty from Petra to get the good stuff.
Anyway, drinking a Tincture will make you Ascendant for a short time and provide access to secrets hidden throughout the city—most notably portals that transport you to the Ascendant realm, where the challenges are held.
It’s easy to tell when you’re close to a portal. A message will pop up on the bottom-left of the screen, notifying you that “the seam between realities grows weaker.” This is how you know you’re in the right location.
There are six Ascendant Challenges in total. Although only one is available at a time. They’re on a weekly rotation and, on the Tuesday of every seventh week, the challenges start over from the beginning.
Keep of Honed Edges
This week’s challenge portal is a bit tricky to reach. It’s found in the secluded undercity area called, appropriately enough, Harbinger’s Seclude. Go to Rheasilvia and move to the northern section of the zone — the big entry hall. Enter here, follow the hallway, and take a right.
Keep going down the hallway until you find a wide open area. This is the same place you would normally go to trade with Huginn and Munnin. Except you want to go forward, towards the big bridge at the end of the circular room. Head to the end of the bridge and pop your Tincture of Queensfoil. The portal is above you, on top of a statue that’s well out of reach. While facing the statue (still standing on the bridge), turn right to reveal a normally invisible series of platforms. Follow them to reach the portal.
Once inside, head towards the well-lit main area. You will find three wizards and three knights surrounding a sword. Kill the wizards to release the sword. You can grab it as soon as the wizards are dead, but get ready to move. More Taken will continuously spawn. It’s best to have a friend or two deal with them while the swordbearer focuses on the knights. Killing weaker enemies with the sword charges its super faster, but the weapon only lasts so long before it expires.
Circle the room, using the sword’s heavy attack to stagger and damage the knights, while trying to isolate them from one another. Once they’re all dead a new message will appear on the bottom-left of your screen, saying “Toland beckons you.” Toland is the (mostly) disembodied voice that guides you in the Ascendant Realm. Now you can find him in the middle of the room as a floating white spark.
Toland wants the swordbearer to follow him through a jumping puzzle. So make your way across the large chasm while jumping from platform to platform. Time your jumps to avoid the floating debris. It will knock you down to your death. Enemies will also spawn on various platforms. Kill them quickly or have your fireteam snipe them. Then you can keep moving. Some of the platforms will disintegrate after you touch them, too. Once you make it to the end, loot the chest and get the hell out of there.
And that’s all for this week’s Destiny 2 Ascendant Challenge! Make sure to check back next Tuesday for our next location and guide. That is if you haven’t reached the new maximum power level by then. Take care!
