Walkthrough - North Gate: The Crimson Maws | Mortal Shell 2

The Sanguine Caverns region in Mortal Shell 2 is the northern-most region of the larger Fainweald zone of the World Information. It contains the Stonebled Gate beacon and the Sanguine Caverns (Gate), which in this walkthrough serves as the second suggested main gate to cleanse in your progress through the game. After having completed the Mushroom Village and Glutted Mire gate, the world opens up to you and you can explore more freely.

And While the player is of course free to go anywhere at this point after having cleared that first Corrupted Gate, the game heavily nudges us to head north by showing us that the second shell, Proxima the Broodseeker is also on that direction. From there, the natural progression of the game would be to keep heading north, to the white section of the map, that one might think is white because is snowy, but this is in fact just the white stone surrounding the Sanguine Caverns (Gate). This is the second recommended gate to tackle during this Walkthrough.

Note: This page covers the path to reach and comprehensively explore the Sanguine Caverns section of the Overworld of the game. There are two other sections of the game that share the same name, the Sanguine Caverns (Gate), and the Sanguine Caverns section within that gate.

Sanguine Caverns Walkthrough

General progression and Notable Finds

From Widow's Overlook to Sanguine Caverns

Starting from the first beacon you have access to in the Fainweald region, Widow's Overlook, the first step is to head north. If we follow a mostly straight line, we'll eventually reach the Blackridge Pass beacon, which is our first landmark. 

Going straight north from Widow's Overlook, the first thing we'll notice is an kind of altar surrounded by Sarcophagi, with dark figures spread around the central statue, seemingly trapped in some sort of black branches sprouting from the ground. These branches are similar to the corruption we have seen before. If you approach the statue in the middle, where an large skull is, you'll be given an option to start a trial. The trial will require you kill a total of 6 wraiths, in 2 waves. The first wave will only have 2 wraiths, while the second will have the remaning four. These wraiths are also the dark figures that were trapped by this corruption.

Once defeated, the statue will be cleansed, no longer infected by the black tendrils, and you will be rewarded with the Retribution Stone Tarstone, which allows you to improve your riposte damage significantly. 

Past the trial statue and Sarcophagi, there's a fork on the road. To your right, you can see Gorf, the coughing giant frog that you can choose to give a Weltcap to in exchange for a reward you can sell to Merrick for coins.

To the left, you can see a big tree over a slope. If you look carefully, you will notice a couple of annoying Chiropterros perched on the branches. As you approach, they will drop and start attacking you, so either shoot them down or be at the ready to strike at a moment's notice. 

After dealing with the Chiropterrors, keep going through the small wooden bridge and activate the Blackridge Pass beacon before continuing pushing north. There is no other beacon on the way to the Stonebled Gate beacon right outside the Corrupted Gate, so make sure you rest in this one to recover any health and Mether's Pulse you may need. 

Note: If you you go around the chiropterrors and instead go to the left and across the longer wooden bridge with the Shielded Deprived guarding it, you reach a Ruk Statue and find the map of the area. It is still always recommended to activate any nearby beacons first before exploring further to ensure you have a nearby respawn point.

From the Blackridge Pass beacon, keep moving north up hill. You'll notice the terrain is no longer green with grass and instead has switched to a more rocky, canyon-like environment. As you approach the end of the slope, you'll hear some commotion, and, if you approach slowly, you'll see a Visage enganged in battle against a bunch of torchers  and  depriveds. You can choose to engage in battle against them or let them kill each other while you reap the benefits of the gloom and just kill whoever remains at the end. 

In front of you there's a large tree, walk to the left, and you should see two paths ahead on you. One leads to the left at the same ground level you are on, and the other goes up a slope to the right, where you can see a Resolve Stalk. Take the path to the right and up the slope. 

Make sure to farm the Resolve Stalk if you need it and go up the slope. Once you reach the top of the slope, you will notice a different looking beacon, and a 4 legged creature lurking around. The creature is a Canyon Crawler. They only appear on rocky environments, and be mindful that they are quite fast to close gaps to you. They appear to be susceptible to range damage, too.

As soon as you walk enough on at the top of the slope the Canyon Crawler will quickly close the distance. Be wary of its sword arm, because they can close a big gap while doing a stabbing attack. If you need to, there's a cart with exploding jars to the left when coming up the slope, you can bait the crawler to follow you near them and explode them with your sidearm.

Once you've dealt with the Canyon Crawler, keep walking to the clearing where it came from. If you look directly to your right you'll see a white stand with a glowing bit at the top through an opening on the stone, this is a piece of Laterite, which you need to enhance your weapons. Make sure to collect it. The Beacon in front of you is different than other beacons you've come across so far. This one is a Shattered Beacon, and it's glowing white by default. If you choose to go inside the beacon, you'll find what is likely your second shell: Proxima the Broodseeker.

Proxima plays a lot different than Tiel, with a grapple hook attack called Biosampler as her Shell Ability, allowing you to close distance with enemies while dealing status effects depending on the level you upgrade it to, and also having her Grafted Armor Passive skill, which offers a flat chance to mitigate damage taken. These abilities make Proxima more suitable for a guarding or parrying build that allows for more aggressive play than Tiel.

After acquiring the Shell, the Shattered Beacon will then be blacked out instead of white as it was when you first found it. This beacon does not count as a regular beacon either and it won't show up on the list of beacons to fast travel to using the the Mether's Breath ability.

Once you are outside the Shattered Beacon, you'll want to head down the road where the T shaped rock or tombstone is. If you are looking straight into the Beacon's entrance, it should be on your view to the right. Check out the wooden platform directly behind the Shattered Beacon so you can pick up the Galvanic Shard there. On your way down, you'll see another Resolve Stalk immediately to the left of the slope. Be mindful of the exploding jars sitting right in between the slope and the stalk. As soon as you approach the slope, however, another one of the Canyon Crawlers will immediately approach you. Once you've dealt with and get to the ground below, 5 woodmen will spout out from the ground. Remeber these are very susceptible to fire, so you can light them up more easily than other enemies. Besides the Woodmen, there is also a second Canyon Crawler lurking around that will come at you in due time. 

Note: The second Canyon crawler in this zone seems to have a patrolling route, and depending on where it is when you come down the slope, you can get attacked by it before triggering the woodmen or at the same time, so tread carefully.

Once dealt with the enemies in the zone, approach the glowing bit in the hand of the petrified body for another Galvanic Shard, then approach the edge of the cliff to the right, near where the exploding jars are, and take the Ventrium from the fossilized statue. In the middle of this area you'll see an animal carcass with yet another Glavanic Shard. If you follow the water to the other side where you can see a wooden tower in the distance, another three woodmen sprout out, but there's nothing there to collect, only a drop to another section of the world. 

Once you have collected everything of value here, you'll want to approach the wall of corruption covering the stone wall nearby. At this point, you will need to have acquired the Mether's Breath ability to cleanse this corruption wall. This ability is acquired by defeating Magadalena, the boss in the first gate, the Glutted Mire region. If you have not yet gone and done that gate, you will have to in order to proceed in this section. 

Once you have acquired Mether's Breath and are able to remove the corruption in this spot, you'll be able to go through the stone arch into the Stones of Remembrance zone. This zone is greener than the previous, looks sort of like a large garden. Turn left immediately and stick to the left wall until you see another corruption-blocked path. Cleanse it to reveal another stone arch. Once you are across the arch, you will be able to see the white stones that make up the Sanguine Caverns section, your objective. 

As soon as you exit the Stones of Remembrance, a couple of Grisha Hunters will come at you. Dispatch of them and cross the wooden bridge to the Sanguine Caverns.

Exploring the Sanguine Caverns

Once you've reached the Sanguine Caverns proper, you'll be facing the Cherubs again, the exploding semi-flying fat babies that you were fighting in the fight with Magdalena. This time around they've adopted a red hue and seem to explode in a massive blood splatter in a more dramatic manner. Being a rocky zone, you can also expect a few more of those lovely Canyon Crawlers, and your regular soldiers, and flying bat enemies that we have dubbed Chropterrors. 

In first instance, you will face 5 Cherubs in the starting zone right after crossing the wooden bridge. Be mindful that one of them is directly behind the big rock in front of you, don't let it surprise you. After the initial wave of 5 Cherubs, another two will be approaching from the cave in front of you.  When you walk into the cave, the Canyon Crawler waiting on the side will immediately start running towards you.

You should be wary of running into a head-on confrontation with the Crawler, because there's yet another Cherub luring behind the stalagmites to your left. Is a better tactic to let the crawler catch up to you until its past the stalagmites, dispatch of it and then carefully reaching around them to deal with the final Cherub. In the image below, you can see the Cave Crawler in the distance and an arrow pointing at where the last Cherub is waiting to get a jump on you.

After dealing with the last Cherub, exit the cave through the opposite side. You will see a slope going down and a path that continues on your level. First, walk to the end of the path at your level. You should see a Gloom Stalk with a lonely Cherub keeping guard. After dispatching it, collect teh Gloom from the stalk and then walk back the way you came. You could jump down from the ledge here, but if you do come back something like 10 steps and stop to look around you, you will see a bunch of stalagmites that are position in a neat line. 

These stalagmites are an illusory wall. Hit it to make it disappear and collect the Glimpse from the corpse on the other side.

After you have collected the Glimpse, you can now make your way down the ramp to the level below. The tree in front of you has two Chiropterrors hanging from it, so when you do approach it too much they will drop, but you can get all the way down and make a sharp U-turn to your right and not trigger them while you explore that side. Here, you will find 3 Stonecrabs and one Ventrium up a tree. 

Getting the Ventrium may seem like it would require you to knock it off the branck is perched at, or that you may need to drop from below and make it fall somehow, but in reality you just need to approach it from ground level after dealing with the Stonecrabs and position yourself in a way the option to retrieve it is given to you.

Turn back after gathering the Ventrium and approach the large tree on the opposite side. You should be able to see the two Chiropterrors perched upside down from its branches. remember that they do have a range attack, so be prepared to dodge if necessary or be aggressive, close the gap and hit them right away to dispatch them quickly.

Once you've dealt with them, you can keep going down the next ramp, where another 2 Cherubs will be waiting for you. No ambushes this time, only these two waiting to attack. After the fight, approach the ledge on the opposite side of the ramp you came down and take a peek. You should be seeing some bloody pools and the remnants of a camp with some boxes piled up and an broken down wooden cart, too.

Drop down to the abandoned camp. Look around the campfor one Common Moonshine and 1 Synaptic Vessel (Close to the fire). From this spot, you can either proceed through the large cavern in front of you, which brings you directly to the Corrupted Gate and its dedicated beacon, the Stonebled Gate which would be recommended in case you are in need to recover health or heals, or you can explore uphill on the other side from where you drop.

If you do decide to explore on the other side, you can reach the stone bridge that connects the Sanguine Caverns with the Gloomshade Grove. On this side, and coming from the abandoned camp, you will encounter 4 Cherubs and one Canyon Crawler. 

Note: The Canyon Crawler will attack the Cherubs if they are on its way, and you are far enough away. So if you take a step back to deal with the two Cherubs behind you, the crawler will dispatch one or two of the other ones. Throughout the game there are several types of enemies that are aggressive towards each other, so you can always exploit that animosity to your advantage. And what's best, you'll get all of the Gloom that generates from them killing each other.

Continuing through on this level, in the direction where the Canyon Crawler came from, following the large blood trail, you will find one Laterite nestled in a bloody crevice on the wall, and another from a protruding growth in the wall just a few steps ahead of that first one.

Coming back and taking the ramp down, you'll see 3 Soldiers and a Crescent Gladiator. You can approach slowly from the ramp to aggro them in groups and force them to come up the ramp and face

you one or two at a time for a more controlled fight. If you approach the edge, enough of them should turn aggressive and approach you. 

Once you've taken care of all three soldiers and the Crescent Gladiator, you can approach their camp. Halfway down, the ramp brings you a flat piece of land where you can see some statues with their mouths ajar in a bloody nook. Approach them and take the Tooth of Nochte from it. As you continue going down, be wary of the bear traps laying on the second ramp leading to the encampment.

Once you reach the camp, 6 Cherubs will sprout from the ground. Some of them spawn closer to the Stoner watching the bridge, and he will kill them, but at least one or two will likely crawl in your direction. take care of them and the Stoner, and be wary of the many bear traps that are lying too on the stone bridge. Don't forget to loot the camp of their 2 Common Moonshine bottles and the Ventrium inside the stone maw on the opposite side of the ramp you came down on.

If you've made it this far, we recommend crossing the stone bridge carefully and looking back at the Sanguine Caverns from that vantage point, where you can appreciate how the rocks were made to look like sharp-toothed maws. The look is thematic with the contents of the Corrupted gate, as well. 

Note: If you do make it through the other side of the stone bridge and into the Gloomshade Groove, be wary of the trap wire right at the end of the bridge, at the stone arch.

Make your way back up the ramp with the bear traps, still being careful not to step on any of them, and walk up to where you fought the last Canyon Crawler and once more back down into the bloodied pool abandoned encampment. Inthe middle, you should see the massive cave where the Stonebled Gate beacon awaits.

No traps and no ambushes await in this short trek to the other end of the cave. You will be able to see the Corrupted Gate's light, as well as the Stonebled Gate Beacon in the distance and some gnarly maw shaped stones protruding from the walls on either side, both closed, and open versions of them. 

With this, you'll have completed the overworld portion of the Sanguine Caverns and reached the Stonebled Gate Beacon. Next step is to cleanse the beacon to gain access to the Sanguine Caverns (Gate) itself.

Sanguine Caverns Walkthrough Notes and Tips

• Sometimes the Common Moonshine bottle outside the last cavern in the bloody abandoned encampment can be bugged and unable to be picked up. If you reload and come back, it should be fixed. If it's the first time you've arrived at the location, you should activate the beacon inside the cave so you can a save point nearby and reload from there.