Harbor
Ignatius has come through on his promise to follow Bryllcream’s schematic. Made to order: one junky fleet of ships. As in, this fleet is literally made of junk. The ships are only just barely seaworthy, and the flagship will require a steady influx of steaming trash containers for the crew to upkeep its condition. So, for much of this voyage, you won’t actually be riding boats. Instead, you’ll have to go scout dry land nearby for trash while defending the fleet from enemy assault.
Before you even get going, Wendy (now some sort of sea-wench; while she gave it an honest try, the role of bard simply wasn’t agreeing with her) will direct you to perform a little initial patching up. Find glowing trash containers, heft them with Y, return to the boat, then toss them into the back with x. You’ll need one trashcan deposited into the boat before it’s ready to shove off. After that’s sorted, the fleet will be off, though it will come under fire from OD almost immediately.
The initial southern voyage through the shipping channel is beset by OD Blowers and the like, but the ships chug along nicely. You can come and go from ship to shore as you like, but stay in the general vicinity of the fleet. The flagship itself makes a fine platform from which to fight, with a deck rail and a wire above that both ring the vessel, so you can continuously grind on the ship while shooting. Remember that when you’re not attending the flagship, there’s nothing stopping enemies from wailing on it uninterrupted. This makes Blowers a larger-than-normal threat in this section; the rest of the time, you can just sort of ignore Blowers if you keep moving and dodge their green shots. Here, the Blowers won’t really care about you anyway; they’ll busy themselves unloading on a big floating target they can’t miss. The first big obstacle is an actual big obstacle: there’s a drawbridge down, which will block the flagship’s passage. Fortunately, a control box near the bridge can be destroyed, causing the bridge to lift. Be proactive about this, leaping ahead of the fleet to destroy the console well before the flagship is in danger of colliding with the bridge. On the way back from the trashed console, grab a trashcan to feed into the ship.
Further west down the channel, you’ll encounter a drawbridge governed by two control consoles. This just requires that you critically damage both consoles in order to raise one bridge. Here, one console is on the north bank, and the other is on the south. You can cross between the consoles most directly by grinding across the very bridge you’re trying to raise. In addition to Blowers and other grunt OD along the banks, you’ll also begin to see pairs of Muggers on the banks here, so watch out.
After progressing a little through the drawbridge, yet another OD type will attack: the Winger, a flying, dragon-like creature that can incinerate grind lines with flames, briefly making whole swaths of grind space unusable. Wingers show up on the minimap as large dots, making it easier to find them quickly. Wingers have just started showing up now because of the length of time of advanced mutations from the start of this whole mess, so they’re not quite in full bloom yet; the Wingers you run into during later events will also be able to launch little annoying blobs called Flobbers at you.
After chugging through the first double-console bridge, you’ll have to double back; the direct way is blocked. Heading north through the channel and eventually around the central island, you’ll fight Wingers and other foes along the way. Continue keeping the flagship up with trash cans as needed. Once you’ve hooked south around the center island, you’ll come upon another drawbridge controlled by two consoles, again set on opposing banks. Bust them both to allow safe passage. Well, relatively safe; from here and for the rest of the voyage south towards a watery Fizzco automated checkpoint, you’ll encounter very heavy opposition. Pairs of Wingers will bombard the flagship with flames from the air, while Herkers stand on the shore hurling rocks and mean looks. Continue to prioritize flagship health, and after that clear out the Wingers as soon as possible. It’s too late now to fail in this Fargarthian escape fable.
Rewards
Completing “Floating Garbage” unlocks Weapon Challenge: Murderang. If it seems like unlocks after such a momentous Mission are sparse, perhaps it’s because you have much more pressing matters to attend to…