The Medium | Second Floor Walkthrough, Where to Find Sadness

After you reach the second floor in The Medium, you’ll need to explore a few different hallways and rooms in order to reunite with Sadness.

The second floor is where The Medium’s puzzles begin to become more complex, forcing you to move between rooms and do a bit of backtracking in order to collect all of the necessary items in order to progress.

If you’re feeling stumped at any part of the second floor area in The Medium don’t worry, we’ve got you covered with a full walkthrough!

The Medium | Second Floor Walkthrough, Where to Find Sadness

After you exit the elevator to the second floor, you may feel a bit lost, unsure where to go from here.

If you look to your left, you’ll see another Niwa Hotel floor plan on the ground.

The floor plan can be a little difficult to read, but it indicates there’s a hallway to the left of the elevator area. 

You won’t be able to go anywhere else on the second floor, you have to take this hallway in order to make your way deeper into the Niwa Hotel.

If you’re still uncertain where to go, you can also hold LB to activate your Insight ability.

In doing so, you’ll see footprints heading in the direction of the hallway that you need to explore.

As you step into the hallway, a wave of moths in the spirit world will come flying at you. These moths are dangerous, so to avoid taking damage, you’ll need to hold RB to use your Spirit Shield and deflect them.

After doing this, you’ll notice that the moths are lingering behind you, blocking your path back to the elevator area. If you try to move through the moths, you’ll run out of Spirit Shield and will take damage. 

Take enough damage and you’ll “die” which forces you to restart the area. Take it from us, leave the moths alone.

As you walk down the hall, you’ll spot a door on your right that you can’t enter. If you hold LB, your Insight will show footprints leading into this room.

Unfortunately, the room is locked. Ignore this door for now, and continue on down the hallway.

If you run all the way down to the end of the hall, you’ll encounter a wall of flesh that you can’t get through as you currently don’t have the Razor.

You’ll be able to pick up the Razor later on as you work your way through the rest of the second floor. 

The game will also naturally lead you back to this flesh wall once you have the Razor, allowing you to cut through it and continue down the hall.

For now, turn around and head back and look for a door on your left that prompts you to use your Out of Body Experience.

When seeing that prompt, press and hold “B” for an Out of Body Experience and make your way into the room in the spirit world.

Inside the room, you’ll find the key needed to open the door with the blue mark on it.

Pick up the key, then press “B” to return to your body.

For reference, above is an image of what this key looks like.

It’s called “An Odd Key” and will stay in your inventory even after you return to Marianne’s body after using her Out of Body Experience.

With the key in your inventory, head back to the door with the blue mark and look at the handle.

From your inventory, select “An Odd Key” and it’ll unlock the door for you.

Once the door has been unlocked, you can proceed inside.

Heading all the way inside the room, you’ll see a hole in the wall that you can peek through. Looking around, you’ll see another hole in the ground in the next room.

This is a clue that you need to head into that next room. 

To get to the next room, head back to the door you entered through. To the right, you’ll find the ruins of a bathroom and a passage through several broken walls. 

Look to your right inside this first bathroom area. There, you’ll see a sink, and inside the sink you’ll spot a note and an empty bottle of pills.

When looking at the empty bottle of pills, hold LB to find the Echo attached to it.

Then, pick up the note to collect a “Mentor’s Diaries” page which, like the postcards you’ve collected from F, serve as one of the game’s collectibles.

When you pick it up, you’ll unlock an achievement for finding it.

If you didn’t get the chance to read it in full, here’s what the note says:

“Dear Ursula,

you’re probably wondering why I would write this letter instead of expressing myself directly. The reason, I’m afraid, is painfully simple.

I’m writing this because I am a coward. Because I couldn’t bring myself to look you in the eye and say what is meant to be said. What must be said.

Because the mere thought of breaking the heart of someone so delicate, so fragile, is simply more than I can bear.

Ursula. My dearest Ursula. These past few months have brought joy to my heart. To know you are there for me. To feel our friendship blossom…

And yet, that is all it can be. Friendship. Close. Pure. True. But never more. 

Please, try to understand, being this close, this exposed, to someone has never been easy for me. Life and its struggles have left me changed. Damaged, in ways you couldn’t possibly comprehend.

You deserve someone to hold you, to share life’s joys and sorrows with you. How I wish I could be that person. But I’m not.

Words cannot express my regret, as I know, deep in my heart, this marks the end of our friendship. Please, forgive me.

Forever, your friend,

R.T.”

Once done in the bathroom, continue heading down the makeshift hallway until you’re able to take another right into the room with the hole in the floor.

Inside, you’ll see a phone that you can interact with. Check out this phone first before jumping down the hole to the room below.

Holding LB to activate Insight and turning the phone around, you’ll find a crack of light for an Echo which you can listen to.

Again, Echoes are one of the collectibles in The Medium. If you find all of the game’s Echoes, you’ll unlock a special achievement.

Next, head over to the hole in the floor and press “Y” to drop down into the area below.

Immediately inside the room to your right, you’ll spot an empty flower vase.

Keep this in your mind, as you’ll soon be able to find the flower that goes inside the vase, allowing Marianne to collect Spirit Energy from it.

To the left of the empty vase, you’ll find a book and fragments in the air that mark a memory that you can reconstruct.

Moving the left stick until the figures are formed, hold it there for a moment and the memory will play similar to an Echo.

In this one, a man is giving a sunflower to a nurse as a gift.

As shown when you’re approaching the book, there’s another collectible nearby in the form of a prescription written out to Ursula Anna Rostkowski.

If you press “Y” you can read the text a bit easier. It says: 

“14.06.1971:

NAME: Ursula Anna

SURNAME: Rostkowski

AGE: 41

Wt: 53 kg

DATE OF BIRTH: 24.05.1930

RX: Pipofezine, Buspirone

CASE HISTORY: Ursula Rostkowski diagnosed with depression, hysteria, insomnia and malnutrition. Treated with electroshock. 

Refill 6 times”

Once you’re done reading Ursula’s prescription, turn around and head left from the empty vase out onto the balconey area.

Eventually, you’ll run into another one of those flesh barricades. As you continue to walk down the balconey, part of it will break. 

Fortunately, there’s a way past this broken balconey area one as the game prompts you to press and hold “B” for another Out of Body Experience.

Using your Out of Body Experience, you’ll be able to creep across the balconey ledge in the spirit world and enter a room at the end that contains an item you desperately need.

Where To Find The Razor Blade In The Medium

Inside the room you explore during your Out of Body Experience, you’ll see a number of things that pull your attention.

Given that you have a limited amount of time using Marianne’s Out of Body Experience, you’re going to want to walk past everything to the back until you spot a door with a hole in it that you can peek through.

While peeking through, you’ll see a bathtub with blood in it. You’ll also encounter a jump scare before the door opens up for you. 

Approach the bathtub full of blood and look down in it. You’ll see a prompt to press “X” and in doing so, will drain the tub of blood.

When the tub has been fully drained, you’ll see a razor that you can pick up.

This is the special Razor Blade that you’ll use to cut through flesh barricades in The Medium.

Once you have the Razor Blade, press B to return to your body.

You can now use the Razor Blade to cut through the flesh barricade, allowing you to enter a room that connects with the room you were just in using your Out of Body Experience. 

In this room in the material world, you’ll find a bowl that can be interacted with to reconstruct another memory.

This one features the nurse again as she cares for a man in a wheelchair. 

Based on the notes found, the nurse is Ursula, and the man she’s caring for is R.T. or Richard Tarkowski. 

To the left of this memory, you’ll find a pot with a dead sunflower inside. 

Press X to focus on the material world in order to collect the dead sunflower and add it to your inventory. 

You’ll need to take this dead sunflower back and put it in the empty vase.

However, as you head back to that first room area, take a right in the room that you entered after cutting through the flesh barricade (that connects to the room where you found the dead sunflower). 

Head down to the bottom of the room, and take a right to find this room’s bathroom area.

Inside the bathroom in the connecting room, you’ll want to look at the broken mirror then LB for Insight to find and collect another Echo.

With everything done in this connecting room, head back out to the balconey to the first room with the empty vase.

When you put the dead sunflower in the vase, you’ll be able to collect the Spirit Energy from it.

You can exit this room by heading towards the prescription note, take a right, then approach a door you can open.

Beyond this door you’ll find another hallway area full of evil attack moths.

Using the Spirit Energy you’ve collected, press and hold RB to run through these moths in order to reach the next portion of the hallway.

You’ll know you’re going the right way when you see an entryway by a yellow poster.

Head right here, then make your way up the set of stairs from this area, to the next area.

As you climb the stairs, you’ll eventually reach a part of the stairs that are gated off. You won’t be able to climb anymore.

To your right, you’ll see a cart. Head over and push this cart out of the way.

Stepping into this hallway, take a right.

Once you do this, you’ll encounter a flesh barricade. Use your Razor Blade to cut through it.

Behind the flesh barricade are moths, hold RB to get through them safely and reach the end of the hall.

On your left at the end of the hall, you’ll find the entrance to the room where you’ll reconnect with Sadness.

You’ll also find collectibles in this room that are worth taking a closer look at.

For example, to the left of the entrance to Thomas Rekowicz’s office, you’ll find a newspaper.

You can press “Y” to read and you’ll get information about Fort Pulaski and the grand opening of the Niwa Hotel.

The newspaper text reads: 

“RECLAIMING HISTORY

Fire erupts in the sky. Explosions echo across the wilderness. Sparks rain down in on the ruins of Fort Pulaski – a once impenetrable fortress that saw some of the most intense fighting during the 1945 offensive against Hitler’s forces.

This time, however, it was not bombs, or mortar fire that lit up the night sky, but a spectacular display of fireworks that marked the grand opening of the Niwa Workers’ Resort.

The event was attended by leaders of the Party, including the First Secretary, who had this to say during the gala:

“Let this site of victorious struggle against the forces of evil become a place of respite for the Working People of the Republic in times of peace and prosperity.”

Liberated in January 1945 by the heroic Red Army, the historical landmark is currently undergoing renovations and will soon be opened to the public at large. 

The Niwa Workers’ Resort will welcome its first guests by the end of June.”

To the right of the desk with the newspaper on it, you’ll spot a box on the ground in the material world. Inside this box are two pieces of paper.

The first is “A Peaceful Place” which is one of the “Troubled Man’s Notes” that you can collect in The Medium.

It reads:

“It’s almost complete.

The main building turned out better than expected. Now it’s just a matter of finishing up the ‘less obvious’ parts of the resort.

God damn, this place is perfect. 

Remote. Peaceful. Hidden away from prying eyes.

Talk about hiding in plain sight.

Took some doing to convince them to let us stay. Luckily, I can be quite persuasive when I need to.

Oh, yeah, I think I finally got it. 

I’ll call it Niwa.”

The second document is an invoice signed by T. Rekowicz.

With this, we can infer the previous note was written by Thomas Rekowicz, the man that Marianne is trying to find.

If you aren’t paying attention to both worlds, the other collectible in this area can be easy to miss.

To pick it up, you’ll have to press “A” as you stand by the box of documents.

The item you pick up in the spirit world is one of the “Eerie Drawings” collectibles.

In the drawing, you see Sadness following behind Thomas Rekowicz as he carries the box of documents that you just looked at earlier.

This is confirmed a few moments later in a conversation with Sadness.

How to Reconnect With Sadness

When you’re done inspecting the room and collecting items, approach the door to the right of the desk with the newspaper on it and inspect the name plate.

It’ll show the room as being the office of Thomas Rekowicz.

After looking at the name plate, a cutscene will happen and you’ll meet up with Sadness again who’ll mention an old man being there recently.

As you speak with Sadness, Marianne will approach the office door and begin to open it. Sadness will panic and tell you that she doesn’t think you should be here.

After opening the door, you’ll turn around and see that Sadness has once again disappeared. 

The next step is to enter the office of Thomas Rekowicz and seek out clues about who he is and why he called you to the Niwa Hotel in the first place.

Be sure to check back, as our next walkthrough will run through all of the puzzles you encounter inside the office of Thomas Rekowicz! 

Related: The Medium Review | A Spiritual Journey