Experience opens the road. Seals open the gate.
Maximum Base Level is 175. Progress pauses at Base Levels 20, 40, 60, 80, 99, 120, 140, and 160 until the corresponding seal is completed.
Follow the current chapter's conversations, exploration, hunting, and guardian objectives. Prepare a guardian encounter at its physical waystone or NPC. When ready, Turn in a quest at the named keeper advances the story and opens the completed seal—no separate Camp services ritual is required.
Base EXP earned while capped is not banked for a later burst of levels. Use the pause to improve your build and finish the chapter instead of grinding against the cap.
From the second seal on, each chapter's guardian answers only after its investigation is finished; the waystone tells you what is left. Guardians change their tactics as they weaken and use a signature attack that is marked on the ground before it lands, always with somewhere safe to step. One seal also asks for a second, different victory.
1. The Unburied Bell / Level 20
Payon Cave is this chapter's destination, with Bell-Bearer at the heart of its guardian trial. Follow the journal for the current route, objectives, and hand-in.
Opening this seal leads toward the next gate at Base Level 40.
2. The Hunger Below / Level 40
The Pyramids is this chapter's destination, with Gilded Hunger at the heart of its guardian trial. Follow the journal for the current route, objectives, and hand-in.
Opening this seal leads toward the next gate at Base Level 60.
3. A Choir Without Breath / Level 60
Geffen Dungeon is this chapter's destination, with Choirmaster at the heart of its guardian trial. Follow the journal for the current route, objectives, and hand-in.
Opening this seal leads toward the next gate at Base Level 80.
4. The King's Unpaid Debt / Level 80
Glast Heim Chivalry is this chapter's destination, with Oathless Knight at the heart of its guardian trial. Follow the journal for the current route, objectives, and hand-in.
Opening this seal leads toward the next gate at Base Level 99.
5. The Door Without Dawn / Level 99
Thanatos Tower is this chapter's destination, with Candleless Abbot at the heart of its guardian trial. Follow the journal for the current route, objectives, and hand-in.
Opening this seal leads toward the next gate at Base Level 120.
6. The Orchard of Names / Level 120
The Valley of Gyoll, past Niflheim, is this chapter's destination, with Name-Eater at the heart of its guardian trial. Follow the journal for the current route, objectives, and hand-in.
Opening this seal leads toward the next gate at Base Level 140.
7. A Crown of Ash / Level 140
The lowest floor of the Rekenber Bio Lab beneath Lighthalzen is this chapter's destination, with Ash-Crowned Regent at the heart of its guardian trial. Follow the journal for the current route, objectives, and hand-in.
Opening this seal leads toward the next gate at Base Level 160.
8. The Last Lantern / Level 160
The sealed gears inside Al De Baran's Clock Tower is this chapter's destination, with First Creditor at the heart of its guardian trial. Follow the journal for the current route, objectives, and hand-in.
Opening this seal leads toward the final maximum of Base Level 175.
Reaching the later seals
The later chapters travel north and abroad. A root path in Niflheim Field leads back to Umbala's caves, so Niflheim is no longer a one-way trip. The sixth chapter's orchard grows past the village, in the Valley of Gyoll.
The Rekenber Bio Lab has no public entrance: from the seventh seal on, the security desk inside Rekenber in Lighthalzen takes you down, and the Rekenber Night Watch on the lab's second floor opens the door to its lowest floor. For the last seal, the Clock Warden on the third floor of Al De Baran's Clock Tower opens the stair into the clock's sealed works. Both door keepers let you through once you have reached their seal.
Characters created before the Covenant
Existing characters keep their levels, equipment, items, classes, and relationships. Seals strictly below their existing base level are grandfathered; the next applicable gate still matters.
They are not forcibly reset or relocated. Create a new character if you want the complete opening experience.
Travelers who were already hunting or fighting for their current seal when its investigation arrived skip that investigation. Hunt marks and guardian victories earned before seals 5-8 moved are kept.