In Zero Parades: For Dead Spies, preparing to kill a Great Lich requires a perfect squad. And if you need a specialist with the most non-standard view of things for the position of an Astronomer, you will have to pick out a Holocene. Cascade’s former partner and veteran of the “Whole Sick Team” would fit perfectly into Operation Zeroing Out the Great Lich. But the path to his recruitment is still a pain in the ass.
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How to start a chain of M.I.H.O. quests?
You’ll have to tinker with the equipment first. We go to Photo 24 and fix a broken fax machine through a Technoflex skill check. As soon as you close the “Contact secret prisoner” and “Indefinite assignment” instructions, the device will spit out a tip to the Nursery Site. Our target will be an old missile silo.
By the way, don’t rush to rush there. It’s much smarter to move up the “Make a deal with multinational Capital” branch first, until the Heartless One sends you to get an old disk. This way you can close both tasks in the same location and save a lot of time.
Descent to the Nursery Area and the Red Disk
The road to the mine lies through the air tramway in Portofair. Look for the right stations on Kvizach Square or just west of the Party Alley location.
The Nursery Site itself is completely dead. The only living soul here is an eccentric metal stripper who will gladly exchange the copper springs scattered around the level for Sol. We go down past the Cardio grandpa (the door behind him, by the way, leads to the disc for the Heartless).
Here’s an important caveat: in the dark, the very locker room girl will jump on you. She desperately needs a Red disk. Apparently, it’s better to give up the piece of hardware without a fight, because trying to stop the madwoman will block you from some of the content in the leitgame. Further down, M.I.H.O. is waiting for you. It sounds like a corporation, but in fact it is a one—man spy agency – Holocene.
Where to find the novel “Blood Type: Hecatomb” and crack the cipher?
Then the classic quest room begins. Holocene asks you to clean up, you find a piece of paper with a cipher on the floor, and the spy pretends that nothing happened and just throws you out the door.
To crack the code, you will need the novel “Blood type: Hecatomb”. The book is lying on Reno’s couch (you’ll find the entrance near the Housing Campaign area). We read it right in the inventory, scroll through all available replicas. Then there are two ways: either we break the code honestly, or we use brute force through checking the characteristics of Nerves.
Too lazy to mess around? Go to Melita so that the Opera does the dirty work for you. Just don’t let her know that it’s for the Holocene, because she’ll immediately refuse to help.
Brain Surgery: How not to Ruin an Astronomer?
Have you solved the code? We return back to the mine. The hatch is now open, and Holocene is sitting tied to a chair below.
To bring the poor guy to his senses, you will have to get into his head through a Poetics skill test. If you have already learned the Duchess technique, you can skip the much easier “Cold Reading”. The guy knocks himself out, and then the hardest part starts. You have to cut a Small controller right out of his brain.
Fail the Coordination roll — the patient will fall back, and you will lose the unique Astronomer forever. If the operation is successful, the rescued person will be waiting for you at the Foggy Mirror location, from where you can safely take him to the finals.
