Destiny 2 Dead Messenger quest steps, including Vox Obscura and Kill the Messenger
How to get the Witch Queen Seasonal Exotic Weapon.
Dead Messenger in Destiny 2 is the Season of the Risen Exotic weapon which has arrived alongside The Witch Queen in Year 5.
This unique grenade launcher is available even for those who haven't purchased The Witch Queen expansion - though it takes a fair bit of questing and activity completion to finally unlock.
Not only will you start with a completely different quest first, the power level requirements are high - so some levelling may be in order if your team's not quite ready.
On this page:
How to get the Dead Messenger in Destiny 2 in brief
Here's a quick rundown of the steps needed to obtain Dead Messenger:
- Play the Witch Queen campaign and complete The Investigation mission
- Complete the Rising Tension quest
- Complete steps 1-7 of Operation Elbrus to unlock the Kill the Messenger quest
- Complete the Vox Obscura mission
The last step in particular - the Vox Obscura mission - is a challenging one, and will require some levelling to overcome.
Here's every quest step in more detail...
How to complete Rising Tension in Destiny 2
Dead Messenger is locked behind two other questlines, the first of which is Rising Tension. Rising Tension unlocks after you complete The Investigation, an introductory mission that sends you to Savathun's Throne World for a brief encounter with an undercover agent of sorts named Fynch.
After clearing this quest and speaking with Ikora Rey on Mars, she'll give you the Rising Tension quest (alongside the first Witch Queen campaign mission, if you own the expansion).
Rising Tension is a fairly straightforward quest that kicks off once you visit the Hangar at the Tower. Caital, the Cabal empress, requests your assistance investigating disturbing developments related to the Lucent Hive.
Descend to Europa and choose the PsiOps Battleground activity from the map to get started.
You'll defeat powerful Hive enemies and then chase one of them down through a series of portals. Each portal has a guard you'll defeat with a Relic Sword dropped by yet more strong Hive enemies, and it culminates in a battle against Mor'ak the Lightstealer.
Mor'ak summons Aspects of Savathun you'll have to defeat with the Psionic Spear that materializes on the left and right sides of the arena. Once the mission completes, head back to the H.E.L.M.
You'll receive the Legendary Recurrent Impact Machine Gun and unlock the next quest, Operation Elbrus, the season's quest, which will update weekly.
How to complete Operation Elbrus in Destiny 2
You only need to concern yourself with the first seven steps, which comprise the first week of the mission. Essentially, it involves playing PsiOps Battlefield to collect Psionic Intel, then exchanging that for a Runic Chest.
The chest gives you insight, which you'll use to upgrade the War Table back at the H.E.L.M. Speak with Saladin afterwards, and he'll offer you another mission. This is (finally) the Dead Messenger quest, Kill the Messenger.
The Season of the Deep is here alongside the Into the Depths quest. You can know go fishing too! Don't forget to keep an eye on the Lost Sector and King's Fall challenge rotation schedule!
How to complete Kill the Messenger and Vox Obscura in Destiny 2
Kill the Messenger is wrapped up in yet another quest, Vox Obscura, and it's tougher than most of the missions in the Witch Queen campaign. You'll need a power level of at least 1500, but is recommended you play at the Powerful cap of 1550. That's a lot of levelling!
When ready, open the Throne World map, and open the Vox Obscura mission banner to launch the quest. This takes you through a time warp on Mars and puts you through a number of timed objectives.
This is a challenge - but can be completed solo, as shown by Esoterickk on YouTube:
The Vox Obscura steps are as follows:
Sneak Into the Hanger
The first part has no timer. Hop onto your Sparrow and race down the hill until you reach the hangar. Deal with the enemies that spawn, including the land tank, then head inside. A timer starts after you defeat the enemies there, and the objective changes.
Clear the Airfield
You have four minutes to destroy all objectives, most of which include heavily armed vehicles. You have access to vehicles of your own, though, including Interceptors. Divide the tasks between your Fireteam members and work as quickly as possible to clear the first area.
The second area has yet more vehicles, including Goliath Tanks, and the ever-present threat of missiles raining down on you. Once the tanks are gone, you'll need to target power supplies located at the base of the towers in the area and roughly halfway up the towers, all while working under the same time limit.
Follow the objective marker after you've finished, use a vehicle to blast the hangar door apart, and move on to the next step.
Race to the Control Room
This involves clearing Cabal Codewardens and their cohorts from a series of three rooms within 10 minutes. The process is the same for each. The Codewarden is protected by a shield, which you can deactivate by defeating the Psion in the energy bubble. Override the consoles as indicated after defeating the Codewarden, and then do the same in the other two rooms.
Defeat Qabix the Insurgent
The final phase is a boss fight against Qabix the Insurgent. Like the Codewardens, Qabix is defended by three Psions in energy bubbles. Defeat the Psions, then unleash your heavy weaponry on Qabix. The shields regenerate with each segment of Qabix's health bar you deplete, so you'll repeat this process twice.
After the battle, head into the treasure room, and you'll get the Dead Messenger launcher from the golden chest inside.
Enjoy using your new grenade launcher!
From here, a Master difficulty version of Vox Obscura will open up. Additionally, know that the mission is home to a very useful Champion farm and, alongside it, a useful Pinnacle source if can you remember to check in each week.