MISSING SKULL

Level by Opaque79

Walkthrough by Phil Lambeth, with the help of Doggett TV's video walk

Lara slides down into a dark cave. Light a flare and find a NW opening to your left. Follow the passage past a fenced-off pool and drop down into a room with a smaller pool. Note the closed doors in this room, five in all, and search the corners near the columns for flares, shotgun ammo and a small medipack. Jump into the pool, swim down into the floor opening and open the S door. Swim to a small room and pull out to find the CROWBAR as two of the doors open in the previous room. Go to the opposite wall and pry off the BLACK BEETLE.

Return to the previous room and go up the N steps and through the opened doorway. Lara's attention is drawn to a trap-filled area to her right. Continue into the small W room and get on the raised platform. Jump up to open the ceiling trap door, turn around in place and jump up again to grab the opening. Pull up and go around the column to a door that opens automatically. Run down the ramp to attract a jackal around the corner, pick up flares and a TORCH in the next room, note the wall sconce and closed floor trap door and go back up the ramp. Light the torch and return to light the wall sconce and open the trap door.

Keep the torch with you, drop down through the floor hole and find a small medipack. Push the block to reveal a wall switch that lifts the E gate. Go down the ramp and light a lamp stand in the room below. Continue into the adjacent room and light another lamp stand to open the N door. In the next room, first pull up into the SE crawl space and flip out the other side for the only SECRET in this level. Grab the large medipack, shotgun ammo and SHOTGUN and return to the previous room. Light a third lamp stand to open the door at the end of the N passage and find a wall switch that deactivates the traps you passed by earlier.

On your way out you'll meet up with a knight who drops a HORSEMAN'S GEM. Run up the ramp, leave your torch behind and use the pushblock to get back up through the trap door opening. Exit S and return to the area that was formerly trapped. Take a running jump N to grab the ledge, pull up and jump to grab the rope. Swing forward and jump off in front of a second BLACK BEETLE. Use the rope to get back across and proceed to the hub pool room. 

Go around the pool and up the S steps past the opened doors. A couple of giant scorpions are skittering about in the cave below. If you're patient, you can hop down onto the corner block and exterminate them without fear by using your pistols. When all is quiet, go to the E wall. Use the ramp supporting the column to your left to pull up onto the ledge with the closed gates for a large medipack. Get down and climb the SW blocks for shotgun ammo (stoop to pick it up). Pull up onto the S ledge and a blade trap ahead will be activated as the door opens.

Roll or side flip past the blade trap and enter the next room. Loop around right for a small medipack and do the same on the other side for flares. Go to the end of the S ledge and time a jump to the central column with the flame blowers. You're safe if you stand between the blowers. Go around right and jump to a corner of the SW block. Jump with grab into the W alcove and pull down the wall switch. Jump into the water and find shotgun ammo near the middle of the S wall. Swim across the room and pull out onto either set of stairs.

Get back to the central column and this time jump to the SE block and into the E alcove. This wall switch retracts the spikes on the taller block behind you, so stand jump to grab the previous block, pull up in a corner and jump W to the spike-free block. Take a running jump S to grab the ladder and climb up for a third BLACK BEETLE. A cut scene shows the gates lifting in the cave where you met the giant scorpions. Go to the ends of this ledge for a small medipack on one side and a SHOTGUN on the other, drop into the water and pull out onto the stairs of your choice. Get past the blade trap and return to the cave.

Pull up onto the left side of the E ledge as you did earlier and go past the opened gates. Enter the next room and wait for the knight to mount his horse. Shoot him from his right side, not his left, and when he dismounts lure him away from the horse while firing away at the blue emblem in his chest. It takes a while for him to die, but he leaves behind a second HORSEMAN'S GEM. Before leaving, grab the flares in the SW corner and return to the giant scorpion cave. Continue NW to the hub pool room and place the Horseman's Gems in the receptacles on either side of the W doors to open them. Go on in to face your next set of tasks.

Search the sarcophagi next to the N and S walls for shotgun ammo and a small medipack, respectively, and note the closed trap door in the center of the room. Approach the W throne and loop around right and left to find one alcove with flares and a small medipack and another alcove with a wall switch that opens the trap doors. Drop down through the floor hole into a dark cave, light a flare and go through the W opening to face a deep pit in which flame blowers are activated.

Hang from the edge and shimmy left around the corner. Follow the wall crack, timing the three flame blowers, shimmy around the corner at the other end and pull up to face a closed gate. Go around the central structure to your left, pausing for a large medipack along the way, and save your game in front of the timed W wall switch. Pull it to raise a block high up in this room. Go to the NW corner, pull up onto the block there, jump S to the ledge, run to the other end and jump to the E block, continue with a jump to the SE block, side flip left onto the higher N block and take a running jump to grab the block near the NE corner. Turn left and take a running jump to grab the W ledge, pull up and run to the timed block. Hop onto it and pry the fourth BLACK BEETLE off the wall.

If you get there in time the block stays put, so turn left and jump up to grab the ceiling. Monkey swing S across the room and drop down in front of a wall switch that opens the gate you saw earlier. For a quick way down, stand jump to the sloped central structure, slide and grab, shimmy right a bit, pull up and back flip onto one of the blocks you used earlier. Safety drop from there to the floor and go around the central structure to find the opened gate. Enter and take the WINDING KEY from the plinth.

Exit E, shimmy patiently past the flame blowers the same way you got here, use the E block in the dark cave to pull back up to the room with the sarcophagi and return E to the hub pool room. Go around the pool and find that the E door leading to the larger pool you saw much earlier through a fence is now open. Go on in and place the four Black Beetles in the central pyramid to reveal the MECHANICAL SCARAB. The water is devoid of pickups, so return to the hub pool room to find that the small door in the NE corner is now open.

Hop into the passage and follow around to the NE corner. Turn around in the alcove and jump to grab the ladder. Climb up to a higher passage, combine with Winding Key and Mechanical Scarab and place the contraption on the scarab tile at your feet to trigger all the spikes in the passage ahead. Follow along behind and pick up the device before proceeding to an opening that overlooks the pool room. Take a running jump E across the gap, grab the facing ledge and pull up. Continue forward and up the steps into the next room to face a demigod. When he dies, the E door opens, so step inside and take that MISSING SKULL from the plinth to end the level.