Cairo Digsite is the an optional story mission in Episode 5.
Mission Summary[]
Mercenaries have taken over a museum in Cairo, head in and clear them out, and see what they are up to.
Gameplay[]
Cairo Digsite[]
Climb up and go in the building. Navigate through the tripbombs. Head upstairs and jump on the exhibit to get on the second floor. There's a partially open door to outside. Slide underneath and get the red keycard. Go back inside and jump down the large exhibit area with the Sphinx. Head to the room with many tripbombs and 2 sentry guns. Inside you'll find a C4. Use it to blow up the metal door in the large room upstairs. Open the door with the red keycard here and take out a cyber-cultist. Hit all 4 switches, this will open doors and bulkheads all over the museum. In Room B4, use the vent. You will eventually drop into a corridor. The room ahead has a swipe card and you can use it right there. Backtrack to stairs and activate an elevator with the swipe card.
Work your way to the broken elevator. Jump off to the ledge. Move around till you find a small stream and follow it. Move to the right just before you see a red hole. Do not drop into this hole. There's a cave on the right side. When you see another opening, hug the right side and go into the next hole following the stream of brown water, then blue, then red. Work your way down till you reach a pond. You will find a large dig site filled with ruins and apparitions. You will find a toolbox in one of the lower areas full of bones. One of the walls has a large door. Go inside. Use the toolbox in the right side switch. Don't open the one straight ahead as there's a sentry gun pointing straight at you. The door on the left leads to weapon for Mikko. Go through the right door. Find a flooded passageway and dive in. On the other side, open the door. A hand switch is useable on the laptop to disable the sentry gun from earlier. Head right. Load up and get ready for a mech fight before hitting the switch. Even when defeated, the teleporter will still operate, this is not a fail state.
Elysian Holidays[]
You start in a dream-like area depending on who you're playing as. Follow the only way forward until you fall into a void with a trail of light on the ground follow it, then wake up. You've lost all your gear so arm up again with what's left on the platform. Move through and talk to the Engineer AI in a control room on the same floor as the teleporter, the AI will unlock an exit in the basement. Go left and down the ladder nearby, and reach the door the Engineer AI will open for you, leading to an underground pond. Dive in and follow the tunnel. The switches ahead activate 2 different doors so you will need to move quickly. Make sure you have plenty of air before leaving the second set of bubbles. Stick to the right wall on your way out and race to get to the surface of the oasis.
Once outside, head up to the ruins and hit the switch to enter. You will find an Engineer key card on a merc in power armour, use it in a gap near the large mural. This will open a shortcut to back to the previous area. Make your way beyond the aqueduct and then a clearing. Move towards the bridge and it will blow up no matter what. Follow the old trail near towards a cave under the waterfall. Move through and use the C4 on the wall to create a path to the other side of the (now gone) bridge.
A camel conveniently waits for you. Travel down the path until you reach an open area. A tank is waiting for you. Deal with it and the mercs, then enter the town. One of the storehouses contains a salvaged C4. Use it on the locked door gate to the main street. When you reach the marketplace, the doors will close and you will face another heavy mech. Defeat it, and the townsfolk will rise and rebel against the mercenaries. Head where the mech came from, to a third area, where guards attack a Juggernaut. Take him out and get a Trinity key there. Go to the docks near the market square and use it to open the boathouse. Get into the hovercraft and drive out the harbor.
The Realm of Tlalok[]
Wake up, get your bearings, begin following the trail uphill on foot. Reach a small rugged hill with ruins. Climb the shrine and reach a puzzle area: shoot the switch (or use the PDU laser) to raise a platform while standing on it. Use it again to shoot another switch beyond a gap in the wall above the first to raise the second platform and create a path. Jump through the vegetation into a jungle. You will eventually find a cave with a cog and several corpses. Pick it up, but a dragon will return to the nest and you must deal with it. Head back to the start, and go upstream using your hovercraft. When you reach the boathouse, drive the hovercraft into the boat-elevator cart, disembark then use the gear on a panel on the left. Enter the hovercraft again and the lift will begin sending you upwards.
Keep going upstream until your find a partially flooded temple ground. There's a cave on the right. Inside is the bronze key needed to open the main gate, as well as some fire golems. In the next area with a lava moat, you will need to find a blue cobra key. Keep left and climb and leap till you find a small cave with the key near a dead EDF Panama survivor. Backtrack to the temple's corner entrance, go through a broken trap room. Use the key in the middle of the shrine. Head back to the area near where you found the blue key. The door beyond the bridge is now open. Proceed through the next area, take out any opposition, find a cave and a go down the path. There's a crack in the wall is at the far end, thankfully a boulder coming after you will crash through it if you don't have explosives.
When you reach the large cenote with a pond at the bottom, jump down into the water. Keep swimming down until you find a dead end with a broken holographic wall, and enter the Engineer geothermal facility. Use the elevator. Follow the red pathways. Dispose of several infiltrators and take the gas mask in the control room near some dead mercenaries. Go past the yellow reactor, and use the airlock into the hazard area. Turn right into the embarkation room with a switch to start up the teleport gate. While the gate activates, a Conservator will arrive and attack you. You have 3 minutes to take it down while the facility breaks apart around you. Once it's taken out, you will arrive back home.
Secrets[]
There are a total of 12 secrets in this mission.
Cairo Digsite:
- In the rear backyard (once you unlocked the shutters on level 2), a vine wall has a gap between bushes, providing grenades and a medkit.,
- In the room with the master swipe card, you can move the cabinet in the corner next to a potted plant to reveal a vent. Beyond it is a Zilla Missile Launcher and DUP shells.
- After dropping from the stuck elevator cabin down to the dig site, before going into the underground river stream, climb the ledge to your left and notice a floating dual MAC 10 hovering on an invisible platform near the statue. This secret is an homage to the infamous location of the Uzis in the original Tomb Raider.
- During your trip in the flooded tunnels with death pits, in isolated ruins with a glowing red crystal and a ladder nearby, one of the two doors can be opened using a switch hidden in a nook in the wall. A dead explorer can be found with some supplies and NVGs in the next room.
- Once at the bottom of the cavern, follow the trail near the tent that goes around the death pit. Once you reach a stimpak, turn around and keep going up into a hidden alcove. it has a door accessible by walljumping, revealing a 4th wall breaking sanctuary with a note from the map's author.
Elysian Holidays:
- In the water puzzle area, under the Engineer facility, the switch at the far end of the last cave while escaping to the surface, opens a door at the start of the puzzle. Reach it again by going through the Engineer keycard lock in the ruins, take the elevator down, then return to the underwater pond. A Megasphere waits in the now open door before the (now closed) underwater gate puzzle.
- In the oasis itself, the waterfall can be reached by parkouring on tree branches. Beyond it on the right is a small hideout where a dead mercenary has left collected supplies. If playing as Rusty, you can talk to his ghost for lore details.
- In the canyons where the bridge blows up, make your way however you like into the river below (there are ropes to climb back up near the collapsed road near the waterfall). Under where the bridge used to be is a skeleton with supplies and Ghost goggles. This is an homage to The Sorrow from Metal Gear Solid 3.
- After going down the trail with the camel, keep going with it until you reach the houses near the crop farms near the coast. Use the camel to jump over one of the roofs, it's actually a courtyard containing a slot 9 weapon and its ammo.
- Once in the 1001 Arabian Nights-themed city, after using the C4 to blow the barricade up, turn left and notice a stack of pots hiding a hole. destroy them then destroy the door beyond it into an alleyway, where you can find a dead mercenary, and a military crate containing a P90, lots of ammo for it, and supernatural squirrel locked inside that was probably responsible for the carnage.
The Realm of Tlalok:
- In the room with the lava pit and the bronze key, follow a ledge by climbing up the platforms directly in front of you when you enter the area, to find a crossbow and a magical orb.
- The moment you reach the cliff near the water at the bottom, don't jump, turn directly left and follow the ledge to reach an overlook with the last EDF Panama casualty, with an AR-65 and a magical orb.
Weapons & Artifacts[]
- Jewel FAMAS (Weapon for Kagura): In the archives room with the master swipe card, in a Shadow Realm pocket through the orb on the table that only Kagura can utilize. Inside are a few enemies and a chest containing this gun.
- Panflute (Weapon for Mikko): On the second floor of the temple at the bottom of the dig site, past the mercenary encampment, on a crate of MS-Corp nuclear fuel rods.
- Gauss Revolver (Weapon for Rusty): On Elysion, in a hexagonal tent at the base of the aqueduct, between the oasis and the canyon.
Other Items of interest[]
- Geoffrey or Mikko can use the VR station to open the grating and grab some supplies in the museum security room.
- In Elysian Holidays, in the cave after the waterfall James can use a time portal near the pillars to get an Engineer SMG and an Engineer shield.
- Zaxtor or Kagura can climb up a wall in the same cave and then jump up the pillars to reach slot 7 weapon and ammo.
- In the Elysion harbor town, Highwire can lockpick a door on the second floor of an inn.
- In the Realm of Tlalok, not far away from the rising platforms, Merlijn can lift a heavy stone door to get some supplies and a magic orb.
Trivia[]
- The first level of this mission was originally a user map for the AMC Squad before being adapted and enhanced for Episode 5 proper.