Ad Astra per Aspera: Stalker 2 Quest Walkthrough

From Shustriy, Skif received a lot of valuable information. The Clear Sky base in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl is well-protected, so now you need to disable four psi-beacons for Skif to pass. In this guide, you will find a detailed walkthrough of the quest Ad Astra per Aspera.

Right after receiving the quest, pay attention to the additional condition. You need to find a suit with good psi-protection. This is optional, but looking ahead, the suit will be useful. There are many mutants in the swamps, critically few bullets, and psi-beacons affect Skif very unpredictably. It's better if you have more or less good protection. Stock up on supplies, medkits, and energy drinks. There's not much radiation in the swamps, but you'll have to run often, as mutants serve as damage sponges.

From the same Shustriy, Skif received a map of the swamps, so now you know exactly where to go. The first beacon will be on a tower. Getting there is simple, but be ready for real crowds of dogs, boars, and tushkans.

The second beacon for us was the device in the church. Here, an unusually resilient cat will attack you, and suddenly the drowsiness mechanic will activate.

We never fully understood whether this is a bug of an unimplemented feature or the effect of the psi-beacon. In any case, inspect the floor at one end of the church (for us, it was on the left) — you can break the boards there. You will find yourself under the floor.

Move a little forward and to the right. Crawl through the hole, and you will find yourself in front of boxes and barrels that you can climb.

Ahead, you need to make a long jump, so gather some energy. Once on the other side, continue climbing to the very top of the church. As soon as you disable the beacon — two ghosts will appear.

The third beacon is in a small fort, but the task is complicated by many zombies and a controller that will start spamming its psychic attack. Even if you quickly deal with the zombies, ghosts will start appearing. Technically, you can skip the entire battle and just shoot the beacon from a distance — it will work.

The last device is waiting on another tower. There's nothing special there except for more crowds of ordinary mutants. That's all for the beacons, but the most difficult and annoying stage is ahead. The swamp is structured in such a way that you won't miss this section, despite the seemingly open world.

While heading towards the target marker, at some point you will encounter a chimera. Most likely, by this time you will already have problems with ammunition, but even if not — the monster absorbs a huge amount of damage and seems to be unkillable by script (though this might not be the case). Moreover, the chimera kills you in two or three hits, causing bleeding with each hit, so fighting it on equal terms won't work.

To complete the beautiful picture, an emission will start according to the script. Your task is to run to the target marker through the swamp, then through the house, and a bit further into the bunker, but the problem is that Skif stops in the water, and seeing the ground through the reeds is extremely difficult. We don't even have any tips for the optimal path — just find this one trail through trial and error. Accordingly, if you hesitate — the chimera will attack from behind. The good news is that after the cabin, the mutant will retreat, but you will have very little time left. Passing this stage without energy drinks is almost impossible.

Once in the bunker, go forward and you will find Faust. After the cutscene, the mission will end, but now you need to get out of the swamps.