We begin Chapter 2 of The Crimson Diamond, named ‘Excursions’ as Nancy and Kimi wake up the morning following the previous chapter. It’s time for them both to move on after their night at the Crimson Lodge despite Nancy’s disappointment.
Kimi tells Nancy to meet her by the front door. Make your way down the corridor and Nancy will start to hear voices coming from two doors, it’s time for some last minute eavesdropping for the road! Type ‘eavesdrop with glass’ into the text parser to listen in on the conversations in Guest Bedroom 3 and the Servant’s Quarters.
Once you meet Kimi at the front door, a cutscene will ensue. Kimi, Nancy, Albert and Jack travel to the train station together, only to receive a telegram reporting that the bridge is out of action following an explosion that happened overnight. The group has no choice but to return to the lodge.
While they wait for news on the bridge, Nancy decides to set to work in gathering mineral samples in the local area. The only problem is that her kit went missing on the train journey to Crimson, so we’ll have to find various tools and items for her to use as substitutes.
Nancy needs four tools to start her sampling:
- A geologist’s pick (or something sharp and strong)
- A streak plate (or just something made out of porcelain)
- A hammer
- A small shovel
Finding the Pick
Head towards the kitchen, on the way there you can eavesdrop on a conversation between Jack and Evan in the study. Type ‘eavesdrop with glass’ into the text parser to listen in. When they’re finished, you can enter the study. Something is smoldering in the fireplace, approach it and type ‘look at fireplace’ to see what’s there and then ‘take tape’ to pick it up.
Now enter the kitchen. Jack is sitting at the kitchen table and you can ask him about a pick. He’ll explain that he usually has an ice pick but it’s gone missing.
Head towards the icebox next to the front door and type ‘open icebox’ into the text parser commands, inside is a leaking block of ice but something seems to be frozen inside it. Head over to the kettle and type ‘take kettle’ then carry it over to the icebox and type ‘pour water on ice’. This will melt the ice, revealing the icepick, type ‘take the handle’ to pull the pick out of the block.
Finding the Streak Plate
Stay in the kitchen to find the streak plate. Here’s a hint: you just need a regular plate.
Head over to the cupboard above the sink and type ‘search cupboard’ and then ‘take plate’.
Nancy needs to check this is suitable before it can be marked off in your notebook, so go into your inventory and select it with the eye icon so that Nancy can examine it and determine that it’s suitable as a streak plate.
Finding the Shovel
Head through the kitchen backdoor into the garden. We can now explore outside the lodge. Go right to find the area with the garden shed and enter it.
Head inside the shed and type ‘look’, ‘look at tools’ and ‘look at table’ to get an idea of the tools available.
Right now, we’ll want to pick up the trowel, but we can also pick up the rope and fly paper now too as these are needed later on and will save us a trip. You can examine the fly paper in your inventory and ask Jack about it for some interesting information which may become useful later.
Finding the Hammer
From the garden shed area, go left and then keep heading south until you find an area with a smokehouse, then go left through a forest path and then south to an area with a jetty. To your left is a log, type ‘search log’ to discover a whistle inside it and then type ‘pick up whistle’. This will come in handy later on.
Go left past the area with a bridge and you’ll find an area with a boathouse. Go inside the boathouse and type ‘search box’ and then ‘take hammer’.
You now have all your tools.
How to Get the River Sample
Now we can start collecting our samples, the first of which we will acquire using our trowel. For this, we’ll have to find some soft ground to dig by water, so we can get this from the area with the jetty, the bridge or the boathouse. Type ‘get sample’ into the text parser commands to start digging around one of these areas.
How to Get the Cliff Sample
Head to the cormorant cliffs left of the boathouse, here we can get a rock sample from the cliffs but first we need to distract Kimi who doesn’t want us to disturb the nesting cormorants.
Remember the whistle we found earlier? If not, it can be found inside the log in the area with the jetty. Once you have the whistle, type ‘blow whistle’ into the text parser commands and Kimi will think a duck is nearby and rush to investigate. While Kimi is distracted, type ‘get sample’ into the text parser commands.
How to Get the Boulder Sample
Head north and we’ll find Albert taking a sample from a boulder, despite Nancy suggesting Albert take a sample elsewhere it seems she is also keen to investigate here too. First, let’s ‘talk to Albert’ to find out more about what he’s doing.
Next, Nancy would like to take a sample from the boulder too, but can’t while Albert is busy with it. Albert doesn’t seem to want to be disturbed and if there’s something Nancy is particular good at, it’s bugging people. So, to get rid of Albert we simple need to type ‘ask about boulder’ into the text parser commands and Albert will eventually get up and leave to work elsewhere. Now type ‘get sample’.
Examining our Samples
Now, it’s time to examine each sample, open up Nancy’s inventory and select her loupe, now examine each sample. You should also rub each sample on the plate by typing ‘rub [sample name] onto plate’ into the text parser commands. The samples can be referred to as the ‘cliff sample’, ‘boulder sample’, and ‘river sample’.
At some point, you should get an objective to ask Albert about his kit to examine the samples further. Head back to the kitchen where Albert is at the window and type ‘ask Albert about kit’ into the text parser commands. He will of course refuse, but will quickly return after leaving the room to announce that his kit has disappeared. Once the cutscene has finished, head into the dining room to start dinner.
Dinner (and After Dinner) Drama
After dinner, Nancy will notice that Margot didn’t come down to eat and Jack will ask her to take a broth up to her in her boudoir, the small room attached to the Innkeeper’s Quarters where we spoke to her in Chapter 1.
Head to the room and type ‘talk to Margot’ into the text parser commands. If you want some further information, you can ask her about her pain and then her allergies in which we’ll get some important information about Evan’s deadly nut allergy.
After this we can ‘give Margot broth’ and go to leave. Just as we’re about to leave, we hear footsteps coming and can hide behind the screen to listen in. Nessa will enter the room with some water and will start an argument with Margot about her relationship with Evan. We can ask Margot about ‘skagway’ for further clarification after the argument. The broth was spilt during the argument, so we can ‘take bowl’ and leave the room.
On our way back to the kitchen, we can eavesdrop on a conversation between Kimi and Nathan in the conservatory. Once Nancy is bored of this conversation, head into the kitchen and ‘ask about garlic’ for some information from Jack on whether Margot eats garlic or not. After, we can ‘give Jack bowl’ and a cutscene will commence, ending Chapter 2: Excursions with a commotion.
