Searching for Answers Walkthrough in Dune Awakening

Searching for Answers starts when you talk to Zantara in Harko Village after meeting Ari at the Salusan Bull in Arrakeen. Telling him you are ready sends you into the Tleilaxu lab under Old Carthag, a locked-in mission of roughly an hour. Bring a suspensor belt, a cutteray, healing and repaired gear: the hard part is a five-wave arena near the end.

Quick answers

This article covers the end of Act 2, "The Assassin's Handbook": A rendezvous with Ari, Searching for Answers and the short Epilogue. Story context: Ari has the Ixian decoder for the minimic film you recovered, and the film points to coordinates beneath the ruins of Old Carthag.

A rendezvous with Ari: where to meet her

After The Jackal, Ari contacts you. Go to Arrakeen and climb to the second floor of the Salusan Bull. Walking up to Ari triggers the cutscene. Zantara crashes the meeting, the film is decoded, and the journey completes on the spot.

Where Searching for Answers starts

Fly to Harko Village and find Zantara. He can stand in either of two spots in the village, so check both pins. When you tell him you are ready, the instance loads. You can't pop out for supplies halfway, so prepare before you talk to him.

What to bring:

• A suspensor belt. A Full Suspensor Belt is ideal; you have to clear a broken bridge.
• A cutteray and repaired weapons and armour.
• Plenty of healkits. The arena throws large groups at you.
• If you value your ornithopter, park it in a garage first (see the bug note below).

Searching for Answers walkthrough, step by step

Fastest way through

• Prepare in Harko before you talk to Zantara. The mission locks you in, and a death without supplies costs more time than the shopping trip.
• Set aside a full hour. If you leave mid-mission, you start again from Zantara.
• Don't fight everything on the way down. Only the arena has to be cleared; elsewhere, push to the next objective.
• Take the iodine pills in the radiation room. They let you grab the key without wasting time on the way back.
• Top up healkits and ammo before the arena: it is the one fight you can't run past.

Common blockers and fixes

• "Find a way inside the base" won't progress. You crossed the bridge but left the fan running. Zantara can't drop until it is off, so find the maintenance room and turn it off.
• "Learn more about the purpose of this facility" is stuck at a locked door. The key is in the small radiation side area, not on an enemy. Check the chest for iodine pills while you are there.
• Black screen, soft lock or escape timer problems. A recent patch fixed escape-timer, cinematic and soft-lock issues in this quest. If you still hit one, leave and restart from Zantara.
• The ornithopter disappeared. Finishing this quest has deleted the ornithopter some players flew in with. Thopters stored in a garage or in the Vehicle Backup Tool stay safe, so after the Salusan Bull scene fly back to your Hagga Basin base, park the thopter in a garage, and only then head to Harko. See how to get an ornithopter if you need a new one.

Rewards

• A rendezvous with Ari: 100 XP.
• Searching for Answers: 100 XP, Zantara's Crysknife, Zantara's Signet Ring and the Ascendant Throne of the Reverend Mother decoration.
• Epilogue: 100 XP.

Epilogue and what comes next

The Epilogue ("Wait to hear from Ariste") needs no extra work. It completes along with the last step of Searching for Answers, once you are back in a base or a city. Ari can't meet you and Elara gives you the cold shoulder, so the story pauses here.

The next chapter, The Great Convention — Part I, opens with The Call: Zantara's bat Noctua finds you in a Hagga Basin settlement, and Elara Tuek then summons you to Harko for Count Fenring. Our Great Convention walkthrough has every answer for the murder investigation, including the From the Ashes code.

While you wait, it is a good time to pick a school with a trainer (see classes and trainers) or to push into the Deep Desert. Chapter 2 sends you there.