Early in Assassin’s Creed Mirage, you’ll need to prove yourself as a thief during “The Master Thief of Anbar” quest line. First, you’ll need to steal a ledger from a guarded compound, and then the ante is upped by going after a chest within the heavily fortified Winter Palace.
There are multiple ways to infiltrate the palace and get the chest. We’ve covered what we think is the best way below.
How to get into the Winter Palace
You have two options when it comes to entering the Winter Palace. You can either follow Nehal or find your own route. For simplicity, we’re going to follow Nehal, but feel free to explore yourself too.
At the start, follow Nehal by hopping over the wall into the palace grounds and then as she leads you through the flower patch pictured above.
There are guards at various points along the path, but if you follow Nehal’s lead and pay attention to her instructions, you shouldn’t have to face them. Just remember to stay crouched and hidden when around the guards.
How to get the key in the Winter Palace
As you move into the palace itself, you’ll need to go your own way to get a key for the next stage. If you follow Nehal all the way, she will eventually be stumped by a locked door, and you’ll need to double back to find the key.
However, you’re able to go off on your own at any time to get it. It’s best to head out on your own after Nehal has led you to the second floor of the palace.
The key is being held by a guard in the main courtyard of the palace. You can see the guard highlighted in red when you use Basim’s Eagle Vision ability. He also has a little orange key icon above his head. See the picture above for the location of the guard within the courtyard and what to look for when he’s highlighted.
To get the key, you will need to knock out the guard and loot his body. It’s easiest to do this if you jump on him from one of the second floor balconies, also pictured above. To knock him out from the second floor, go to the balcony directly above him and edge close enough for the takedown prompt to appear on the screen.
How to get the chest in the Winter Palace
Once you have the key, head back to Nehal and the locked door. She’s just off to the right of where the key guard was standing. The door is represented by an orange icon on the main map and mini map.
You can once again follow Nehal through the corridors behind the previously locked door. However, keep an eye out for baskets and crates that can be looted as you go. Lootable boxes will appear with a white dot on them, like in the picture above.
There are quite a lot of them in the corridors of the palace, containing all different types of goodies.
After making your way through a few corridors and avoiding some guards, you’ll enter the room with the chest, and a cutscene will begin. You don’t need to do anything else to get the chest.
How to escape the Winter Palace
After the cutscene, you need to escape the palace and make your way back to the safety of Dervis’ house. His house is also represented by the orange marker on your map.
Unlike your stealthy entry, there’s nothing quiet about how you’re leaving the palace. You’ll need to sprint and parkour your way around the guards on high alert.
You can make use of ropes between the palace and Dervis’ house to zipline portions of the route. Making it much easier to avoid the guards. Remember, you still can’t easily kill the guards yet, so it’s imperative that you avoid them.
We also recommend sticking to the rooftops as much as possible, as there are fewer guards up there. If you get caught and killed by the guards, you’ll start back at the beginning of the chase, so don’t worry about having to replay the whole mission.
Once you reach Dervis’ house, the mission will be complete.
