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// Precursor: Tackling the Citadel 
// Story: Jak and Daxter: Heirs of Mar 
// by Blackdrag-rose 
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The moment Jak, Twilight, Starlight, and Cozy were ready to move forward, and enter the Citadel that Gol and Maia worked in, the four of them moved forward and found that the Precursor Door opened without anyone needing any Blue Eco this time around, which was good since there was none on this side of the structure, to which the siblings moved up the steps and entered the short tunnel that was revealed to them once the door had opened itself, where they found a few glowing panels on either side of them and kept their guards up as they pushed through a second door... one that lead them to a massive chamber, which just so happened to have a number of platforms and wooden paths, not to mention a massive Precursor Robot that had a bunch of metallic alterations added to it, which was protected by a Dark Eco barrier, no doubt to prevent any harm from coming to it.

"I knew that it was only a matter of time until you four showed up!" a voice stated, where the siblings watched as a metallic cage floated down to where they were standing, which was near the edge of a circular platform, and found Samos waiting inside it, though there were a number of Dark Eco bars keeping him trapped inside the cage so he couldn't do much to aid the siblings in their mission, or even free himself for that matter, which was understandable given that Gol and Maia went through a lot of effort to capture him and the other Sages and that they didn't want their captives to escape before they completed their plans to awaken the Precursor Robot, which was when Samos started talking again, "Are you four ready for the greatest challenge of your entire lives?"

"As ready as we can be, given everything we've done to reach this point," Jak replied, though at the same time his sisters nodded their heads to show that they agreed with him, while Daxter remained silent since there wasn't much he could do at this point in time and was leaving everything in the lands of his friends, to which the four of them glanced around part of the massive chamber they were in and noticed a few more metallic cages that seemed to be on a level that was above where they were currently standing, ones that were either larger or thinner than Samos' cage, which had to be where the three other Sages were being held captive, before he focused on Samos again, "Is the situation as bad as all of us assumed when we heard what Gol and Maia were planning?"

"I'm afraid so!" Samos stated, where he took a moment to raise his staff and carefully beckoned to the rest of the massive chamber that they were standing in right now, even if he was focused on the three Sages that understood and channeled the other three types of Eco that were common in their world, but one thing Jak and his sisters noticed was that the pair of Dark Sages were nowhere to be seen, meaning they were either still working on the robot or they were carefully watching what was going on right now, before making themselves known to the siblings, "As you know, Gol and Maia kidnapped the other Sages so they could drain their energies to power this abominable machine, and then, when I returned to my hut so I could prepare myself for what we might find inside this Citadel, they ambushed me and imprisoned me as well, though I did put up quite the fight, given that Keira must have discovered my now ruined hut... also, you should free the Blue, Red, and Yellow Sages first, as they have been here the longest and, if they aren't freed soon, I'm afraid that they might perish if too much time passes. Also, the Dark Sages have set up a barrier around their modified Precursor Robot, a barrier that is powered by the same type of Eco that they studied, which will require the power of the other three Sages mixed with my own to even bring it down, especially given how strong our foes are, but you four will have to be quick, as this robot is just as Gol and Maia said, it is the only thing that can open the Dark Eco Silos and, more importantly, there is no telling when they'll return to power their monstrosity up and bring ruin to our world... so hop to it!"

The siblings nodded their heads, even though Samos didn't have time to say anything else as the cage was moved to what looked like a higher position inside the Citadel, near the ceiling to be exact, to which they stepped forward and started to see what this place had in store for them, even though Cozy smashed a Scout Fly box that was resting nearby, as none of them had been expecting to find any of the little robots in this place and it just meant Keira either found this place earlier and forgot to tell them about it, which was unlikely, or Gol and Maia snatched the little robots and scattered them around the Citadel, just to toy with the siblings when they arrived to save the Sages. One thing the siblings discovered, as each of them jumped over to a spinning platform that wasn't attached to anything at the moment, was that there were a number of basic Lurkers just walking around some of the wooden walkways that were scattered throughout the Citadel, but there weren't any large group of enemies for them to deal with and they jumped over to the path on their right, where it wasn't long before Cozy kicked a lone Lurker in the face, knocking it into one of the support beams that seemed to be holding up all of the wooden walkways, a metallic one that meant they wouldn't have to worry about something breaking on accident, before they continued moving forward, only to stop at the peak of this part of the walkway. The reason for them stopping at the top of the first walkway was because there was a metallic button resting right in front of a gap that connected to a walkway that moved away from the twisted Precursor Robot's resting place, even though the other walkway had another button on it, though when Jak pressed it into the ground they watched as a number of square shaped Precursor platforms emerged from the depths and fit into place between the two walkways, meaning it was like a bridge of some kind for him and his sisters to use to reach the other side, even though Twilight had to raise her eyebrow for a moment as she found that each of them had colors on top of them, as some had a red square on top, a few had a blue coloration, others had a green color, some had a yellow coloration, and some had nothing. When Jak stepped on the bare square platform that was in front of him both he and his sisters watched as it and the other bare platforms fell back into the depths of the Citadel in seconds of Jak walking on it, causing him to quickly jump over to another one that had a blue color, causing those ones to fall as well, before he jumped to a green one and then crossed over to the other walkway, causing the platforms he hadn't touched to fall into the depths, meaning that only one of them could cross the platform riddled bridges at a time, meaning he and Daxter could watch as Twilight, Starlight, and Cozy did what he just did a few moments later.

Once the four siblings were back together they walked down the walkway each of them had crossed to and Jak punched a Lurker that was in front of them right in the face, knocking it right into the wooden ground before they noticed the first of the three paths that would eventually allow them to access the areas that the Sages were being held in, though this path had a bunch of fragmented platforms that seemed to lead the way forward, as while each of them were circular in nature the first one in front of them seemed to have been cut into fourths and two of them, in a diagonal sense, had been pulled out at some point in the past, even though they were likely moved to another part of the Citadel, something that caused Daxter to scratch his head for a moment as he and the siblings stared at the platforms.

"Out of curiosity, why did Gol and Maia feel the need to install these platforms in their Citadel?" Daxter asked, because that was something that had been bothering him since they entered this place and talked with Samos for a few moments, who he had decided to ignore in favor of getting the siblings closer to taking down the Dark Sages before they ruined the world they called home, but now he decided that it was time to voice his question before Jak and his sisters moved further into the Citadel and were preoccupied by whatever traps Gol and Maia might have set up for them, where he noticed that they had paused for a moment while they stared at the area in question, "I mean, thanks to all of the Dark Eco that they have access to, they were able to give themselves the power to fly through the air and teleport from place to place, so why did they feel the need to install all of these platforms, which can be rather hard for novice adventurers to navigate through, in the first place... especially since most of them don't seem to be connected to anything!"

"Hm, this is a guess on my part, but I have two ideas: the first being that the arrangement of the platforms helps channel all of the Eco energy from the Sages to the Precursor Robot," Twilight replied, as the question had piqued her interest and she was willing to explore it for a few moments, though she had to be quick about responding to Daxter's question so they could continue exploring the Citadel and determine which path they wanted to tackle first, even though since they were near the Red Sage they might tackle this one first and then focus on the other two paths at some point in the future, which was when she focused on the question once more, "the other idea, which is the more logical option of the two, is that Gol and Maia designed the inside of their Citadel with the express purpose of using the Sages and tampering with the Dark Eco barrier as steps to activate the twisted Precursor Robot... meaning that, if the latter idea is right, we'll be doing some of the hard work for them, so they won't have to expand their own power to do so."

"You know, this is one of those times where I hope that your wrong about what's going on," Starlight commented, as she, Jak, Cozy, Keira, and Daxter had a good amount of experience when it came to Twilight and her speaking her mind on all of the things that she studied, more in the sense that the majority of her more dangerous opinions on things seem to be the way things go, so if her sister said that Gol and Maia might be using them to free the Sages, who will then fire at the Dark Eco barrier to bring it down, there was a seventy-five percent chance that she was right, at the very least, with a ninety-five percent chance of her being right at the max, hence the reason that each of them were silently hoping that this was one of the rare moments where Twilight was wrong about what they were looking at.

Twilight shrugged for a moment, as while she shared Starlight's sentiments about her response, because this happened to be one of those rare times where she wished she was wrong about thoughts on the matter, she had the feeling that this was one of those times where she hit the nail on the head and that the Dark Sages were using them to enlist the aid of the other Sages to lower the Dark Eco barrier, though since there was nothing they could do about this, since if they stood still and did nothing three of the four Sages would die, they crossed over the gap that was in front of them and landed on one of the halves of the spinning platform. Starlight jumped over to another walkway, one which rested to the left of the area her siblings were standing in, and smashed the second Scout Fly box to free the little robot that had been trapped inside it, while at the same time Jak leapt over to a new pair of sectioned platforms, these ones being on two different levels, as the first was on their level and the other was above them, while moving in a different pattern than the fragments they had just been standing on, so he had to double jump to reach the second part of this particular platform, though while he did that his sisters followed after him. From there they noticed something interesting, there were a number of platforms that had fragments missing, as one was split up like the one Jak happened to be standing on at the moment, while another was just half a circle and a third was three-fourths of a whole platform, though eventually the couple of fragmented platforms lead to a somewhat thick metallic walkway that went from one side of the tunnel they were following to the other side, which had one of the buttons in the middle of it and the third Scout Fly box, the latter of which was smashed to pieces and they freed the little robot that had been trapped inside it, before they focused on the area that rested in front of them, as each of them were interested in what they were about to tackle next. It was in that moment Cozy activated the button and they watched as a large number of square platforms raised from the depths of the Citadel, forming a pathway for them to take and use to access the next part of the area that Gol and Maia worked in, but from what they could see there was a number of missing sections and whoever went forward first would have to be careful, since stepping on a single color would cause all of the other platforms that shared that color to fall into the depths not a few moments later, so instead of the siblings tackling it at the same time, given the platform spell Twilight could use and Starlight could likely replicate it, Cozy decided to step forward and see just how bad this area actually was.

Cozy carefully jumped forward and picked the color she wanted to land on, knowing that all of them would drop as soon as she did that, but it did allow her to discover that they were close to the other end of the path the platforms connected to, which was interesting and meant she wouldn't have to wait for the others to catch up with her, before she jumped over to the next color and made sure to pick up all of the Precursor Orbs that were in her path, even though there were one or two that had to be missed and would be picked up by her siblings when they tackled this path, and then crossed over to the end of the path, allowing the remaining platforms to fall and her to take a small break by a Precursor Door as Jak and their sisters did what she had just done. It didn't take Jak, Starlight, and Twilight all that long to cross over the platforms so each of them could reach the area that she was standing in, where her thoughts had been correct and Starlight had used her magic to claim the Precursor Orbs that were resting above the square shaped platforms, though as soon as all four of them were together once more they turned towards the Precursor Door and approached it not a few seconds later, where it opened without needing any Blue Eco and they discovered that it held a tunnel that would take them to the next section of the Citadel, or at least in the direction that Jak had picked out earlier. One thing they discovered was that a Yellow Eco vent rested in front of them and that there were a number of metallic boxes resting along the entirety of the tunnel, which meant there were some more Orbs for them to pick up and add to their collection, which was when Jak and Cozy took a few seconds to empower their bodies with the Yellow Eco as Twiight and Starlight kept their eyes open for any traps that might have been placed in this tunnel, even though they noticed a few fireballs rushing through the air and smashed into all of the metallic boxes that rested between the Precursor Door they had walked through and the opening that would let them access the next section of this area. It was in that moment, when the siblings reached what appeared to be the one-fourth mark of the tunnel, that they noticed three machines that seemed to be in the middle of gathering Eco and turning it into the Snow Bunnies Jak and Twilight had encountered on Snowy Mountain, only these ones didn't have the icy color and, instead, they had a blue coloration, meaning they were just Bunnies or Citadel Bunnies, and there were a lot of them gathering near the opening, even though a few of them got in the way of Jak and Cozy's fireballs and were blasted into a wall not even a few seconds later.

Fortunately there happened to be a Red Eco vent just beyond the opening they were heading towards and Cozy took in its power not a few seconds later, allowing her to smash the power sources of all three machines to pieces and power down all of the devices, while her siblings took care of the rest of the Citadel Bunnies, which just so happened to be when the door to their left opened and revealed a few moving platforms that they carefully jumped across, before reaching an area that one of the cages was resting in, one of the larger ones due to the fact that the red skinned individual inside it had a plump and round body, while he wore a metallic set of clothing over his body, which had a pair of tubes that carried Red Eco from one part of his body to another, before they smashed the nearby power source and powered down the Dark Eco beams that were surrounding the Red Sage.

"You've finally come to rescue me!" the Red Sage commented, showing that he had seen the bars of his cage fall and that he knew the group was standing behind him, hence the reason that he turned around to look at them, even if he liked to chuckle while he did so, which revealed that he had a white mustache and what looked like a modified miner hat resting on top of his head, which sort of made sense due to the area his hut rested in, before he seemed to focus on the siblings and what was important, to him anyway, "Do you know how long I've been in here, trapped inside this cage? What took the four of you so long? Either way, I would like to know the names of my rescuers."

"This one's Jak, and these are his sisters Twilight Sparkle, Starlight Glimmer, and Cozy Glow," Daxter replied, speaking just before the rest of the group could even say anything, though he surprised them by not mentioning himself first, like he did in the past, rather he introduced all four of the siblings and made sure to beckon to each of them in turn, just so the Red Sage knew who each name belonged to, even though they were sure that all of the Sages knew who the siblings were, due to the fact that Samos happened to have several meetings with the other Sages in Sandover Village, before he focused on the here and now as he beckoned to himself as well, "oh, and I'm Daxter."

"The five of you are real heroes, no matter what you or anyone else might think!" the Red Sage stated, though that was the moment he raised a hand to his chin for a few seconds, even though he seemed to be touching a small white beard, as he started to turn around so he could stare at the Dark Eco barrier and the Precursor Robot that rested behind it, where it did look like he might be studying what was going on at the moment and whatever he might have overheard when they talked with Samos a few minutes ago, "You've got to stop Gol and Maia from launching their robot and opening the Dark Eco Silo that they're interested in! Here, I'll use my Eco power to start breaking open the barrier, so when you free the other Sages we can break it apart and get at the robot itself!"

The siblings barely had a chance to say anything as the Red Sage started to channel whatever power remained within his body and fired a beam of Red Eco energy at the Dark Eco barrier, where they knew he would need his full concentration to do what he was doing, so they grabbed the Power Cell that had been powering his cage and added it to their collection, to which they gathered some Blue Eco that was nearby and used it to power a platform that allowed them to descend back to the walkway that was in front of the path that had brought them to the resting place of the Red Sage's cage, which was when they started moving forward once more. From there the siblings quickly walked over to where Starlight had found a Scout Fly box earlier, the second one that had been smashed open, and used the button that was resting beyond where the container had been resting to reveal another set of small square platforms that they needed to take one at a time, as it was easier that way, hence the reason that Twilight crossed over it this time around and carefully jumped over a few gaps that were beyond the end so she could kick a Lurker in the back of the head and knock it out, as it had been guarding yet another button, one that seemed to lead over to where a new path rested, which might bring them to the where the Blue Sage's cage was resting. Instead of doing anything else Twilight remained still and watched as her siblings crossed over the small bridge that she had jumped over a few moments ago, though at least none of them had to worry about any Orbs to collect along the way, though once everyone was back together she activated the next button and revealed a larger set of platforms that formed the way forward, to which she paused for a moment to plan out her course before jumping over to the first of the colored platforms she picked out, leaving Jak, Starlight, Cozy, and Daxter to watch as she carefully crossed this section of the Citadel and came to a stop on the other side, so she could wait for them to catch up and use her magic to catch whoever fell into the depths, even if she was sure that such a thing wouldn't happen at all. Fortunately she didn't have to do that and it was only a matter of time until all four of them were standing on the other side of the gap that the platforms had formed a bridge over, and they made sure that all of the Precursor Orbs that had been resting above all of the small square shaped platforms had been collected, before they headed through the Precursor Door that was resting in front of them, so they could see what sort of challenge and traps would be waiting for them this time around, despite the fact that the path to the Red Sage had been easy for the most part, which did make everyone a little nervous about what else they might find inside Gol and Maia's Citadel, and Daxter was even included in that count, despite the fact that he was the only one doing nothing except sitting on Jak's shoulder.

On the other side of the Precursor Door they discovered a massive chamber that had a vast open pit, one that seemed to be as deep as the depths of the main chamber that the robot was resting in, though fortunately for them there happened to be a few platforms and metallic pillars which might form a makeshift walkway of sorts to the highest point of this area, or at least that was what the siblings assumed based on what they were seeing right now, and the first thing they did was take turns jumping over to a circular platform that was moving in front of the edge of the section that the Precursor Door happened to be resting in, as while there might be room for two of them to stand on it at a time it was safer for someone to lead the way and let the others see what sort of tactics worked. This time around Twilight stepped forward and jumped over to the first platform with ease, where she let it move through the air and bring her close to where a second one, even though she discovered that the second one was moving from the level her platform was on and stopped when it was close to the top of the square shaped structure that rotated every now and then, or at least a part of it moved with the rest of it staying still, given the post between the two that moved with the upper section, though when the vertical platform came to a stop for a moment she jumped over to the top of the square box and braced herself. The box seemed to move after five seconds or so, the highest being ten by her count, so the wait between it rotating meant it had to be powering something that was inside the Citadel, possibly some of the machines that were in this section of it to be exact, but Twilight made a note of this place, to come back to it later for a more thorough investigation and study, given that she might not be able to ask the Dark Sages about this place in the very near future, before jumping over to another moving platform, even though she had to brace herself against the moving top of the box for a few seconds before doing that and landing on top of the smaller platform when it stopped near her location. From there she found that the next square headed pillar had a device that fired beams of energy, which weren't Eco based due to everything she was seeing, that struck the top of the square, to which she wondered if this place was a foundry, a place where people went to make things by heating them up and using a hammer and some tools to make other shapes, depending on one's need, but the moment the beam was gone, for the next few moments anyway, Twilight jumped onto the top of the square structure and braced herself as it rotated to a new position, and then she dropped down to a platform that was behind it, which was when she jumped back onto the top of the square platform and beckoned for the others to follow her.

As Jak, Starlight, and Cozy started to follow in her footsteps, or hoofsteps as Daxter loved to say, Twilight jumped over to a larger circular platform, one that seemed to be missing the center piece of it, meaning one of the three smaller ones she had just passed over had to be the piece in question, and waited for a few seconds as she watched another platform move over to an area that was close to where she was standing, one that she jumped over to and landed on with ease, where it brought her over to an area that a Blue Eco vent rested in and had some Precursor structures resting near it, ones that she was sure they had never seen before and it made her interested in what these might have been used for by the ancient race that Samos and the Sages tried to study. Fortunately there was a wooden walkway for her to jump to and she did so without delay, where she studied the Precursor structures for a few moments and then tapped into the Blue Eco that was resting near her position, something that allowed her to power up the structures, where the tops that were attached to the platform actually separated from the structures and raised into the air not a few seconds later, forming a path that would let her access the walkway that was at the top of this area, which seemed to be heading for another Precursor Door that had to be where the exit rested. Ascending the path the platforms created allowed her to collect a number of Orbs, thanks to the Blue Eco that was coursing through her body, another small bit of Blue Eco to top her off, and smash a Scout Fly box, the fourth of the seven, before jumping over to a number of small square shaped platforms that were moving along a set path that had two of the heated beams firing down at the platforms, beams that she was going to have to avoid just so she could reach the end of this area, and it didn't take her long to reach the end of the path, which allowed her to find that there was a Precursor Cache near a doorway which had to be the exit, and since she still had a bit of Blue Eco inside her it was incredibly easy for her to open the Cache and claim the Precursor Orbs that were inside it. While she did that Jak and their sisters continued along the path that Twilight had taken to reach the exit, so all she had to do was wait for a couple of moments and her siblings joined her, to which they opened the door she had stopped at and discovered that they had, in fact, reached the location of one of the Sages, as there happened to be a lanky blue skinned individual who had a couple of metallic components on his body, like the helmet with tubes on his head, or the bracer on his left arm, and it appeared that he had a blue electric-like mustache on his face, based on what they were seeing from the backside.

Instead of wasting more time the siblings made sure to smash the machine that rested nearby and the Dark Eco bars fell in a matter of seconds, just like what happened when they found and freed the Red Sage from his cage earlier, which was when they gathered near the edge of the area and waited for the Sage to say something, even though Cozy made sure to grab the Power Cell that had been powering the Blue Sage's cage, adding it to the collection as well, which was followed by the Sage noticing the bars were down, meaning he must have been lost in thought before their arrival, and he tapped his wooden staff, which had a few metallic components attached to it, and turned around so he could determine what was going on, something that brought a smile to his face when he noticed them standing nearby.

"Good work, fellows!" the Blue Sage stated, his tone revealing that he was pleased with what they had done so far, both in reaching the Citadel and freeing two of the four Sages from their cages, since he could see the Red Sage's beam and that meant he was the second one to be freed from his cage, even though Twilight could tell that he was more of a energetic person and it made sense when they thought about the type of Eco that he had access to and studied, hence the nature of his skin, before he seemed to think about something for a few seconds as he stared at the four of them, five if one were to count Daxter, "Old Samos was right about you!"

"Really? What makes you say that?" Jak inquired, because it was odd for them to hear something like that, especially since it took him and his sisters a lot of effort to even gain any praise from Samos, especially since the Green Sage seemed to be thinking the 'tough love' approach was best for them, though at the same time he guessed it made sense considering the fact that Samos might tell the other three Sages more about his feelings on the him and his sisters, not to mention all of the progress they happened to be making, so he was curious as to why the Blue Sage would say something like this and he could see that his sisters seemed to share his sentiments.

"Sorry, I can't say anything." the Blue Sage replied, almost as if he was trying to apologize for even saying that to begin with and didn't want them to waste too much time thinking about whatever Samos had told him and the other Sages, which did cause them to wonder what in the world Samos might have told the others in the past, before he focused on the area that was in front of them and seemed to snap back to reality, though out of everything they had seen so far the only odd thing about this was that he seemed to be noticing the Precursor Robot first the first time, making the wonder if he had actually been asleep until the cage had been powered down, "Great piles of Precursor metal! That insidious mechanical creation must not be allowed to wreak its terrible havoc on our world! I will try to actuate the shield door by eliciting a conduit of energy between myself and the vast portal below!"

"Twilight, you speak... um... nerd. What did he say?" Daxter asked, though it was in that moment that two things happened at the same time, Twilight sighed as the Blue Sage raised his staff and loosed a burst of Blue Eco that quickly slammed into the Dark Eco barrier that was resting around the massive robot, showing that he must have seen what the Red Sage was doing and happened to be replicating it before their eyes, though at the same time Daxter could tell that what he had said must have annoyed Twilight in some manner and he hoped that it wouldn't come to bite him in the rear later, if they beat Gol and Maia and saved the world from their dark plans.

"Basically, in the simplest of terms, he's going to try opening the barrier by blasting it with his Eco Powers,in the form of a blue Eco beam," Twilight said, as that was the core idea of what the Blue Sage had just told her and her siblings, even if it had gone right over Daxter's head, though even as she said that it sure looked like the Sage in question seemed happy by the fact that she understood what he had said and informed the rest of her group as to what was going on at right now, so he could turn his full attention to the Dark Eco barrier and join what the Red Sage was doing, to which she shook her head and turned towards the nearby platform, "Come on, we still have one more path to check out, before we focus on finding a path that will lead us up to where Gol and Maia put Samos' cage in."

With the Blue Sage free to fire upon the Dark Eco barrier and join the Red Sage's assault, even though he seemed to be in the middle of changing the frequency to better match what his colleague was doing, Twilight took a moment to use a bit of Blue Eco that was resting nearby to power up a Precursor platform, just like they found near the Red Sage, and used it to get back to the main walkway that was resting near the massive Precursor Robot so she could access another set of small square platforms with the colors on top of them, which allowed her to get over to a part of the wooden walkway that was close to the start of the Citadel, where she paused and waited for Jak, Starlight, and Cozy to catch up. Once they were back together Jak jumped over to the next fragmented platform, a three-fourths one to be exact, and found that the next set of platforms that needed to be crossed just so happened to have two halves of the same whole, even if neither of them were synced up with each other and spun in different directions, though while one happened to be on their level the other was on a higher level, which was around the time that Starlight pointed out that there was a set of platforms near what looked like the end of the path that would bring them to the Yellow Sage's cage, one they would have to explore once they freed the Sage in question. Using the couple of platforms allowed the siblings to reach a new tunnel, which was identical to the others they had walked through, and move towards whatever challenges were waiting for them this time around, only for them to stop after they passed through a Precursor Door, one that brought them to a massive portion of the Citadel, one that was far larger than the one that rested between them and the Blue Sage's resting place, though this time around the four of them noticed that there was only one way to move forward and that was by using the nearby Blue Eco vent, as in using its power to restore the power to the various jump platforms that were in front of them until they reached the end of the path. It was in that moment that Jak empowered his body and unlocked a nearby Precursor Cache, grabbing every Orb that rested inside it, along with smashing the fifth Scout Fly box so he could free the little robot that was resting inside it, though while he did that Starlight quickly accessed the Blue Eco vent and launched herself into the air as she started to move forward, allowing Jak, Twilight, Cozy, and Daxter to watch what she was doing and the path she was taking, which allowed her to collect a number of Precursor Orbs that rested between her and her destination, not to mention finding a few more bits of Blue Eco, which seemed to wander into this area, to keep her going to the very end.

Interestingly enough she found another Cache resting in front of a Precursor Door, where the latter had to be the exit for this area, based on what Starlight and her siblings had seen so far, to which she quickly used what was left of her Blue Eco to unlock the Cache and started to collect the Orbs that were resting inside it, since she turned around to watch what her siblings did as they crossed the platforms and headed for where she was standing... where they found a stout man, who had yellow colored skin and had some plating over his body, waiting inside the cage that the path had brought them to, though he wore a tank on his back and carried a long weapon in his hands, a gun based on what they recalled him calling it in the past, before Jak smashed the power course and the bars disappeared.

"Who would have thought that I would live to see the day when I needed to be rescued by a boy, his sisters, and their pet muskrat!" the Yellow Sage commented, though as he spoke the siblings got the feeling that he wasn't happy about being put in this cage, nor was he all that grateful towards them, in fact he almost seemed like Samos in that regard, but he also reminded them of what happened when they encountered the hillbilly inside Boggy Swamp, making them wonder if there was a connection between the two or if it was just a coincidence, before he sighed as he shifted his stance and focused on the Dark Eco barrier, "I'm going give Gol and Maia a little payback for these embarrassment... then, once we take care of them, we'll see about cooking up some muskrat stew."

The siblings said nothing to that as the Yellow Sage fired a beam of Yellow Eco down at the barrier, matching what the Red and Blue Sages were doing, though before they could move from the area they were standing in they noticed a new set of platforms rising out of the depths and came to a stop when they were in position, giving them a way up to where Samos' cage rested, though once that was done the siblings turned to the right of where the Yellow Sage's cage was location and focused on the other set of moving platforms that they had seen earlier, to which Twilight jumped along the fragmented platforms that were near the Sage and found the sixth Scout Fly box resting there, allowing her to free the little robot as Jak powered up a platform for them to return to the main walkway again. Instead of heading back over to the walkway in question the siblings found that it brought them down to a wooden platform below them and it had a button to cause one of the set of colored platforms to rise up, to create a path for them to jump along before reaching the main walkway, but as Jak did that he noticed that the new set of platforms had six of them in total, set in a diagonal manner, and that he and his siblings were pretty close to the part of the Citadel that the new path rested in, as the set of six platforms was on the other side of the wooden walkway that was right behind the Precursor Robot's backside, though it didn't take them long to reach their destination and stare up at the new path. A few seconds later Jak started to ascend the new path and quickly found that, in order to actually make their way up the platforms with any sense of speed, they were going to have to take turns and perform the double jump to reach the next one in line, with Cozy performing the high jump to verify the types of jumps to go from one platform to another, before they reached a number of platforms that had been cut in half and put in places where they were close to their other half, where it looked like they had to carefully jump up six more platforms so they could reach a wooden walkway that seemed to be a resting place, in addition to the only place that would allow them to reach the rest of the path that would bring them to where Samos was located. As such Jak was the first one to jump up every platform, even if he had to be careful and take his time with these particular obstacles, but as soon as he reached the top of this section of the Citadel he beckoned for one of his sisters, who were patiently waiting on the last of the circle platforms, to do what he had just done and it was Cozy who followed after him first, followed by Twilight once Cozy was done, with Starlight bringing up the rear, before they stared at the upper part of the Citadel and found that there were a number of moving metallic pieces, some having platforms of a diagonal nature while others had a more flat area for them to jump to, which seemed to lead the way up to Samos' location.

While they carefully jumped along this new path, where Twilight found that it had to be providing power to the robot so it would be ready for Gol and Maia's plan, the siblings determined that this part of the Citadel was actually rather easy, even if sometimes they had to wait for their platform to line up with another one, before quickly reaching the end of the path and jumped up to a wooden walkway that curved around a large Precursor structure that the robot would move through when it was ready, and what they did was jump over the gaps and collect what appeared to be the rest of the Orbs they would find on this adventure, including a Power Cell that came from the last Scout Fly box of this region, before they found the power source of Samos' cage, resting near a Precursor Door, and smashed it, which gave them one more Power Cell, for a total of a hundred and one if Twilight's calculations were right.

"I must say, the five of you did rather well to clear this place, and your teamwork seems to be improving," a voice said, not that the siblings were all that surprised to see Samos fly up to where they were standing and face them, even though they could see that his expression really hadn't changed all that much, but at the very least he seemed pleased by everything they had done since this adventure started, before he raised his hand to his chin for a moment as he focused on them and all the obstacles they had overcome to reach this point, "Perhaps I've been underestimating all of you this entire time... maybe you do have what it takes to be heroes!"

Daxter looked like he wanted to say something, anything to be exact, so he could counter what Samos said or start a small conversation with the Green Sage, but in the end he decided that it was best to just take the compliment and not give the Sage a reason to bash him and the siblings like he usually did, mostly by saying something about how his opinions of them weren't that high or something, and he could tell that the siblings were surprised by his restraint, though he wanted to get this adventure over with and that meant dealing with the robot, before figuring out how to defeat Gol and Maia before the Dark Sages destroyed the world.

"Anyway, I'm going to combine my own Eco power with the rest of the Sages, so we can open the barrier," Samos stated, as it was time for them to get ready for a battle that would determine the fate of their world, for if they won this battle the Sages would likely write tales of their deeds that would be lost in the years to follow, while if Gol and Maia were the victors the world would be destroyed and twisted into who knew what, though it was in that moment that he glanced down at the robot for a few seconds, "I'm sure that one or two of you have figured this out by now, but the Dark Eco barrier is linked to the Precursor Robot and as long as it remains up, like how you found it when you entered this place, you won't be able to do any damage to Gol and Maia's creation, much less destroy it, so the other Sages and I will have to stay down here and keep channeling our energies at it, to give you a chance of breaking, and possibly, destroying the robot... all I can say is good luck, as you're going to need it."

The moment Samos flew down and struck the barrier with his own Eco powers, adding a burst of Green Eco to the mix and joining what the other Sages were doing, Gol and Maia suddenly appeared in the air near the area the siblings were in and flew down to the Precursor Robot, where they slipped through the barrier as soon as it opened and quickly opened up the side of its head so they could enter what had to be the command center for it, though as soon as they were inside it they moved up through the massive pipe that the siblings were standing on, heading for the Dark Eco Silo so they could enact their terrible plan, and they prepared themselves for the greatest battle of their lives.