Babi Lighthouse



Babi Lighthouse (バビ灯台, Babi Lighthouse) is a dungeon-style location on the northeast tip of Gondowan, and serves as the first "part" of the final three-part dungeon "set" in Golden Sun. It is entered north of Lalivero and connects to the underground Tunnel Ruins, which in turn connects to the actual dungeon area within Venus Lighthouse. It and the area right before it, the Road to Babi Lighthouse, are counted as one area.

It is modeled (and named) after the biblical structure, the Tower of Babel.

Walkthrough
Upon entering the half-completed lighthouse icon on the world map just above Lalivero, go to where the NPC workers are, climb up the ladder, and climb down the ladder to the right of that. To the right of that is a Move-able and Carry-able block. Go up the rightmost ladder and push it two spaces left, then cast Move to move it one space up, then cast Carry and drop it one space left. This forms a hoppable path to the chest above, which contains a Lucky Pepper. Go up to the next screen.

You would only want to go into the entrance of the main lighthouse structure on later, return visits to the Babi Lighthouse/Tunnel Ruins/Venus Lighthouse set, because right now the door at the bottom chamber you're going for is locked. First, climb down the ladder to the left, and in the underground room, stand two spaces away from the left of the two neighboring pillars and use Move to move the left pillar left one space. Then climb back up above ground, move the right pillar outside the Lighthouse one space in any direction to uncover another ladder leading to the same room underground, and back underground, use Move on the right pillar and move it one space left. Proceed until you get back outside to where a small plant is, and use Growth on the plant - temporarily switching classes if necessary - to turn it into a ladder. You will be lead inside to a spot where you can slide down a slide into an abyss, where you will land right next to a Jupiter Djinni on a platform. Save, then battle it to earn the Jupiter Djinni Luff.

From where you got Luff, slide down, then go up the left series of stairs at the top until you get to where you can choose between two slides into the abyss from the upper left; Slide down the upper slide to fall three floors down to a cavelike area where several NPCs are located. Before going to them, go out the bottom left exit and reenter immediately, so that the bottom chamber door mentioned earlier now remains open as a shortcut for future revisits. Lengthy cutscenes await when you step up to where the NPCs are, during which you need to cast Reveal so as to flip a hidden wall switch near the door. This door will close on its own as soon as you go through it from either side, but that should be irrelevant; go down the stairs to enter the next part of the dungeon set, the Tunnel Ruins.

Collectibles
Luff: In the tower structure, reached by dropping off the left of the three slides on the top level.

Lucky Pepper: In a chest in the road area reached by Moving and then Carrying a block into place.

Background and Story
Prior to the construction of the Babi Lighthouse, this was originally the site of a set of ancient ruins called the Venus Ruins, representing an apparently Venus-aligned culture that was here in the the ancient past. Within the ruins that were originally here is a cave with a door that only Adepts may enter, and it connects to an underground set of passageways that connect to the interior of Venus Lighthouse to the south; obviously, since none of the residents of modern-day Lalivero to the south of the Venus Ruins are Adepts, let alone those of the Venus element, they are just as unaware of the underground passage to Venus Lighthouse as they are unaware of the mysteries of Venus Lighthouse itself.

Over a decade ago, Sheba as a baby came to the world through strange and spectacular circumstances to say the least; she fell out of the sky in the appearance of a shooting star and landed in the center of the ruins, landing with enough explosive force that a massive depression in the ruins were created, but Sheba was not bruised from the impact at all. The adoptive Laliverans, of course, would view her with a nearly divine reverence because of this and label her "Child of the Gods" as they raised her.

Prior to the start of Golden Sun, Babi, the lord of the powerful city of Tolbi to the northeast, orders both his workmen and the workmen of Lalivero to construct Babi Lighthouse, a tower named after him, choosing the exact location of the ruins as the location of the Lighthouse and deciding that the ruins would be used as the tower's base foundations. To persuade the Laliverans to labor on Babi Lighthouse for him on their sacred cultural ground, Babi uses blackmail; he has Sheba taken back to Tolbi and held captive as Babi's guest in his personal palace, and proclaims that Sheba will only be returned as Babi Lighthouse is completed. Obviously, the Laliverans develop a deep resentment towards Tolbi's borderline imperialism and disregard for cultural heritage, but they have no choice but to comply for Sheba's sake.

Babi intentionally makes the construction of Babi Lighthouse come across as pure vanity, putting even Tolbi's workforce under the impression that the tower is being constructed as a symbol of his and Tolbi's everlasting power and control over the northern portion of Gondowan. He has a far more relevant reason for having a tower constructed here of all places, which he keeps a secret to himself; Babi has lived long beyond his years thanks to a mystic fluid he got from Lemuria, the city hidden in the misty Sea of Time in the center of the Great Eastern Sea, and intends to have soldiers sail back into there to get more draught. However, as the perimeter of the Sea of Time is typically an impassable labyrinth of whirlpools and disorienting currents amongst the stone crags, the only way for anyone sailing into the Sea of Time to keep a straight course is if they have a consistent bright light for reference; when Babi Lighthouse would be complete, Babi would have a bright light placed on the top of the tower to serve this purpose. Babi Lighthouse's location is the point on Gondowan closest to the Sea of Time in relative terms. (Incidentally, Venus Lighthouse has long been studied by Tolbi, but they have not been able to solve its mysteries and have not been able to figure out how it can be lit.)

Late in Golden Sun, Saturos' group of traveling Adepts, whose aim is to light all of the Elemental Lighthouses, come to Babi Lighthouse, having found out that it contains the pathway to Venus Lighthouse that they have been seeking. Saturos and Menardi have apparently been getting all the more brutal in this late stage of their journey, for they use their Mars Psynergy to attack and leave wounded the workmen and Tolbian soldiers that attempt to get in their way - evidence of this scuffle is left on the now-scorched ground in front of Babi Lighthouse. Sheba was seen traveling with Saturos as one of his captives, which put the Laliverans in an uproar; Sheba's adoptive father, Faran, and a small group of other people from Lalivero go into Babi Lighthouse themselves in pursuit, but find that Saturos' group has apparently passed through the underground door in the cave that neither Lalivero nor Tolbi have ever been able to open.

Babi's second-in-command, Iodem, arrives at the cave under Babi Lighthouse with a group of young warriors led by Isaac. Isaac's group, who have been pursuing that of Saturos for their own important reasons, open the sealed door with the help of their Psynergy abilities. Faran is astounded, but he and Iodem quickly find out that the door automatically closes to prevent anyone that is neither an Adept nor accompanied by at least one Venus Adept, which means only Isaac's party can continue forward. Accepting that people like themselves would only get in the way of those like Isaac that have those sorcerous powers, Faran and Iodem call on Isaac to follow Saturos into Venus Lighthouse and rescue Sheba from their grasps. Isaac's group goes through the door to cross through the underground passage.

At the end of Golden Sun, the Venus Lighthouse is activated, and it establishes a bright, spherical beacon of purified Venus energy upon its aerie; while doing so, the structure generates a violent earthquake across the surrounding landscape, which among other things causes the half-complete structure of Babi Lighthouse to collapse. The Laliverans superstitiously believe this to be a divine retribution upon the Tolbians for trying to build on consecrated ground, but as Venus Lighthouse is now emitting a light that would more than suffice for Babi's original plan, the destruction of Babi Lighthouse is of little consequence to him personally.