OK guys, here's the deal. Factions does this... THING... where it puts you in a mission with two teams. This only happens twice in the entire campaign but it is still weird and kind of annoying. What am I talking about? What two teams? I only see my own teaaaaam whaaaaaat. Well, the thing is, Factions likes to make things complicated for story purposes. See, Factions-born characters had to venture into the Undercity for their primary, while foreign-born characters got to stay above-ground, so while everybody has to do Vizunah Square to continue the story, you each start in different outposts and thus load into different locations in the mission when you start, but there are two teams (why Anet didn't just have the story leading to the same outpost and both teams starting from there is beyond me). You can talk to eachother via the same team chat even though the other team doesn't appear in your party menu. Sometimes, however, you end up with a party of henchmen for the other team if nobody is trying to do the mission at the same time as you. Also, any non-hench team coming in from Vizunah Local (i.e., Factions-born) will usually not be lv 20 or have max armour because their story path doesn't actually take them to Kaineng City (unless they've read my walkthrough~ :op or someone told them, whatever). If you have a friend who has the other outpost that you don't have you can usually time it so that your two teams end up in the same mission instance together, which usually makes things easier. Also, one more note before we get started: Foreign-born characters can get into Vizunah Local if they get into a party doing A Master's Burden and the Factions-born player is the party leader. This isn't really all that important unless you want to do the "team with my buddy from another outpost" thing. Oh, one more thing really. This is an escort mission. Factions is full of escort missions. Factions chars have already dealt with this nonsense for their previous missions. In this one, each team has their own escort NPC (although both show up on the party list so either side can heal them if they're close enough). Why do you need to heal them? Well, if an escort NPC dies (even if there are two and the other is still alive) you fail the mission. This also counts as a death for survivor characters so, KEEP THEM ALIVE AAAGGGHHH. Moving on...

By the way, there are a TON of elites that you can cap in this mission, so be sure to bring a sig or two along. Yeah, these bosses also appear in explorable areas but since you have to do this mission anyway might as well cap them now. Alright, so, even though you two (as in, you two teams) load in different areas, you will soon join up and continue together. Foreign-born chars, please skip to the next paragraph. Factions chars, you load behind a locked gate with Master Togo (your escort NPC). The countdown to the mission begins (around 50sec). About 10secs after the countdown ends, or whenever he gets bored of waiting, Togo informs you that he's sent for a healer friend of his named Mhenlo to come help all the way from Ascalon (a region in the Prophecies campaign). The gate then opens, so head forwards and down the flight of stairs. You find yourself in the middle of an open courtyard-type place. You're going to spend about 1/3 of the mission here. Soon after you arrive, Afflicted start popping up out of holes in the ground from three locations: where you just came from, in front of you to the right, and behind you to the right up some stairs. Your best bet is to stay in the middle of this courtyard so that Master Togo doesn't get murdered ^o__o^;; Also, keep an eye out for Canthan Peasants because when they die (which they often do even if no enemy has targeted them at all) they will usually be infected with the plague and turn into an Afflicted (in case you are doing the mission and then wonder where the hell those random Afflicted behind you by the closed gate came from ^O__o^;; ). These first waves (before the other team arrives) will be made up of mostly lv 10 and 14 Afflicted, with a couple of lv 20's and one lv 24 boss at some point. Around the time the boss shows up the other team should join you here in the courtyard and you'll be together for the rest of the mission. Skip the next paragraph.

Foreign chars, you start out at the north end of this mission, behind a locked gate. Mhenlo is here too (your escort NPC), and the countdown to the mission begins (around 50secs). After about 10secs after the countdown has finished, Mhenlo finally starts talking, and informs you that this area has been quarantined to prevent the spread of the plague, but that he's bribed the guard to let y'all through. ... the CDC would have a fit if they knew about this. ^<__<^;; Anyway. After the gate opens, you see a path clear of enemies. Do not be fooled, however. There are three Am Fah spawn points before you reach Master Togo (they jump down from the rooftops as you've no doubtedly seen at some point already). I put their spawn points on the mission map so you know where they are so you can drop spirits or set traps or whatever while these idiots are busy rappelling from the rooftops (cause while they're doing that you can get some free hits in cause they don't start attacking til they've hit the ground). The first one is almost right outside the gate, about two aggro bubbles away, where the path gets narrow just after where some pillars rise up from the middle of the path. This first spawn exchanges some trash talk with Mhenlo but no other spawns in this mission do that so don't get used to it. This is basically just a straightforward path until you meet up with the other team, so just keep following it. After awhile the path opens up a bit and there's a ledge. From here you can see the other team but you can't join them yet. Keep going and right at the next turn in the path is another Am Fah spawn. The last spawn before you meet up with the Local team is after you pass some weird orange circle thing on your compass (you won't see it in the field) and the path goes downhill. There's a lighter patch of grey ground near the middle of the decline, and this is where they will spawn. After they're dead, keep going a bit more and eventually you'll find an open gate on your left and some stairs leading down. Here's where you join up with the other team. Sometimes they've finished off all of the enemies by the time you get there, but often enough they haven't, so go ahead and give them a hand.

So, now we're all together. Foreign team, meet local team. Local team, meet foreign team. Foreign team, if you have minions, please head to the gate at the very back of this area because otherwise Mhenlo will get distracted healing them and the mission doesn't continue until the cinematic finishes, and the cinematic doesn't start until Mhenlo reaches Master Togo. Also, Factions characters already know this (and Nightfall characters, really) but the "bonus" parts of missions in Factions usually involve a time trial, i.e., you get more EXP/gold and the Master's reward (counts towards Protector title (NM) or Guardian title (HM)) if you finish the mission under a certain amount of time. In Factions the time limit is usually 25min (if you go over this time you don't fail the mission, so don't worry. You can take as long as you like, you just won't get as much EXP/gold or progress towards the title).

After the short cutscene, more Afflicted appear from the same spots as before (i.e., southwest by the stairs the Foreign team comes down from, southeast up the stairs where the Local team enters from, and northwest up some stairs). There are still some low-level Afflicted here, but most will be lv 20. Your primary targets are lv 20 monks (have Ray of Judgement which really hurts), lv 20 ritualists (the only ones that have res), and lv 20 elementalists (for obvious reasons), in that order. Remember, Afflicted explode when they die, which will hit anyone even relatively close to them and hurt a lot so try to avoid standing near them. Again, stay down near Togo and Mhenlo so they don't go and get themselves killed. You might want to have one person pull mobs to make things go a little faster, as sometimes the mobs will procrastinate a bit before going off in search of someone to hit. After awhile the Afflicted stop showing up and Master Togo wonders why this is the only district that's been hit by the plague (even though, you know, 1) they're EVERYWHERE in Cantha (you'll find this out soon), and 2) WE SAW THEM ON SHING JEA ISLAND! I think Togo has Alzheimer's... ^<__<^;; ) and is therefore convinced that the answer to why the plague exists is somewhere in Vizunah. The ugly teal gate in the back now opens (if it's not opening it's cause you've got minions and your escort NPCs are being distracted by them. Back up all the way to the gate to get Togo and Mhenlo close enough to the gate to trigger its opening) so head on through. The Am Fah random ambushes that the Foreign team had to deal with in the beginning of this mish exist at any point in this mish where you're not standing in one area fighting Afflicted, so be aware of this. Mostly cause there are two right outside this ugly gate, ahaha... Keep going forwards up a ramp and all the way to the back. Where the path makes a right turn is another Am Fah spawn. Right here, two Canthan Peasants will turn into Afflicted, so make sure you've killed two Afflicted before moving on (otherwise one Afflicted might spawn and kill Mhenlo and/or Togo who are lagging behind while you're off banzai-ing to the next area). After this recent mob of Am Fah and the two Afflicted the path is clear until you get to the next open area. There are another three Afflicted spawn points here, two on the left-hand side and one on the right (they are denoted by peach-ish rectangles on your compass). I suggest keeping the top-left spawn point outside your aggro bubble near the beginning so you can hopefully not aggro three mobs at once. Keep your eye out for the ele boss that sometimes spawns in this area, as this area is the tightest quarters in the entire mission and that makes for a lot of pain, so if you see him, take him out quickly. Same goes for the monk boss.

After the waves of mobs subside, Master Togo seems to shake free of his Alzheimer's and informs Mhenlo of the outbreak on Shing Jea. They both ponder why Shiro's become so active all of a sudden, 200 years after he was executed. Maybe he just took a really really long nap? After the discussion the gate opens, so head on through. After two right turns you'll be on the other side of the canal from where you just fought the mobs of Afflicted. Be aware that two Canthan peasants here will turn into Afflicted, one right at the last turn and the other near a house in front of you. Just after that house is another Am Fah spawn (after the slight decline in the path). There's another spawn right before an open gate just a bit further on. In this next area is the last area you will have Afflicted coming at you from three different directions. Right after the gate are some stairs going down on your right. There are some other stairs going up in front of you and some going down on your left. Go down the ones on your left and make your stand here, since Togo and Mhenlo stay over on the east side of this area. There is a ramp leading down onto a lower level on the south side of this area. DO NOT go down this ramp. Afflicted spawn from down there, but they also spawn at the west end of this middle level and at the top of the stairs that went up that we just passed. Just stay here and let any Afflicted that spawn down below come to you. If you want, you can have the other team stay at the top of the steps that came down to this middle area so they can deal with the top Afflicted and the middle Afflicted while you deal with the middle and bottom Afflicted. Same deal here as in the other two places. Waves and waves of Afflicted attack you but it eventually stops... After they're gone, head down the ramp that I told you not to go down before and stop at the gate. Togo and Mhenlo speculate that Shiro is looking for something and that it involves reading lots and lots of books. And then destroying those books, apparently ^O__o^ I mean, I don't think having a huge army of monsters invade those libraries or whatever, especially monsters that explode when they die, would preserve any of those books. ^<__<^;; Anyway. Right outside of the gate is another Am Fah spawn, kinda like as if that Canthan Guard had given them a cue that we were coming ^<__<^;; TRAITOR! After you dispose of them, the path is clear until the very end so just follow the path until Mr. Talky-Shiro'ken Thing starts babbling. This is your last battle here and all of the enemies you see are all of the enemies you will get, so no more mobs popping up out of holes in the ground or anything. The Shiro'ken guy isn't that much more dangerous than anything else so feel free to ignore him until after you've taken care of your usual Afflicted targets (monks, eles, rits...). After the entire mob is dead, the cutscene triggers. Usually I don't really comment on the cutscenes since I always post screenies of them but I do want to mention one thing about this cutscene. YOU WILL DIE IN IT. And yes, this will count as a death for survivor characters, so if you're a survivor character and don't want to die, Alt-F4 out of the game as soon as the cinematic starts (not before it starts because you'll have to redo the mission). If you Alt-F4 after it starts you'll still get credit for completing the mission but won't die. Yay? Yay. OK, moving on...