Yampi Desert Cave

The out-of-the-way entrance into Yampi Desert Cave requires using the Sand Psynergy in Yampi Desert, and Teleport is needed to delve further.

Yampi Desert Cave (ヤンピ砂漠地下洞窟, Yampi Desert's Underground Cave) is an optional late-game dungeon in Golden Sun: The Lost Age. Its entrance is well-hidden within a dungeon-like location explored much earlier in the game, Yampi Desert, in the upper-left region of the continent of Osenia. Its entrance can be accessed as soon as you have acquired the Sand Psynergy from Gaia Rock, but entering the actual dungeon proper requires collecting the Teleport Psynergy from Mars Lighthouse near the end of the game.

Much like Treasure Isle, Islet Cave, and Anemos Inner Sanctum, this is an "extra-hard" dungeon that includes an optional boss, Valukar, which guards a summon tablet that teaches the party the Daedalus summon. It also contains a collectable Venus Djinni, and every randomly battled enemy drops a significant item.

Walkthrough

The existence of Yampi Desert Cave is first alluded to by the large, sandfall-filled outdoor screen at the east end of Yampi Desert. If you cast Lash on the coiled rope to get to the screen's second sandfall from the left that you would use to get to the chest with the Trainer's Whip below, you can climb the cliff ladder above the sandfall to make the entrance to the cave visible at the left edge of the screen. A short time later in the game, if you cast the Reveal Psynergy from Air's Rock at the left of the two 3x3 arrangements of standing stones along the bottom of the area, it will change its shape to an arrow pointing to the upper left, reinforcing the perceived significance of the cave lying in that direction.

However, you will only find yourself at the bottom of the screen's leftmost sandfall, with rocks blocking the top edge of it, blocking you until you have collected the Sand Psynergy from Gaia Rock. Casting Sand on the sandfall allows Felix to climb up along the sandfall and materialize above the rocks at the top. Even then, once you step into the cave, all you will find is a Water of Life in a chest and a patterned circular pad on the ground. Near the end of the game, return here with the Teleport Psynergy found at Mars Lighthouse and case it on this pad to warp inside into the dungeon proper.

Note that casting Retreat from anywhere in this cavernous dungeon will deposit Felix back to whichever entrance he used to most recently enter Yampi Desert itself, despite the cave and the outside desert displaying different location names whenever they are first entered. Transitioning back from Yampi Desert Cave to Yampi Desert, whether by using Retreat or by using the teleport pad and stepping back out of the cave, will reset all puzzles inside the cave, which ensures the player cannot accidentally render the dungeon permanently impossible to complete by exiting the cave at certain sensitive steps.

Exploring the dungeon

The Sand Psynergy is critical to solving this and other puzzles that involve rolling pillars.

From the starting teleport pad inside the main dungeon, always ignore both branches off to the sides of the pad because they lead to dead-ends. Head north along the sandy trail, then head northwest from the open cave doorway atop the vaguely T-shaped intersection, and cast Sand to bypass the three rocks to the west. Cast Burst on the cracked post to remove it, then hug the left perimeter without going down the downstairs stairwell until you get to a pair of rolling pillars from above. Push the horizontal pillar down and the vertical pillar right, then head north, push the other horizontal pillar up, and cast Sand to traverse under it. You will enter a diagonal branch near the north end of this floor, where you can detour a very short way to the northwest and cast Scoop to retrieve the highly valuable Mythril Silver half-buried in the ground. Now follow along the southeast branch counter-clockwise to get to the downstairs staircase at the northeast corner.

Now downstairs, Sand your way into and out of the sandy indentation underneath the lone earth pillar above lots of grayish rocks, and cast Move to shift the pillar onto the indentation to lock it there for as long as Felix remains in Yampi Desert Cave. Head south and collect the Dark Matter from the chest to your right, then head south to a rolling pillar puzzle with Sand tiles making up some parts of the ground underneath the pillars. Roll the right horizontal pillar down, then the left horizontal pillar up, then the right horizontal pillar back up, freeing the right vertical pillar to be rolled all the way to the right. Now use Sand to position yourself above the right horizontal pillar and roll that back down, then do the same with the left horizontal pillar. Cast Sand once more on the sole sand tile available to your lower left so that you can push the leftmost vertical pillar right.

You are presented with a branch left of the sand-and-pillar puzzle where you can either climb up a wood ladder or head southwest. Climb the ladder first and follow along, hopping across a wooden stake, until you can position yourself right of an earth pillar and remotely move it onto the sandy round indentation in the ground left of it. Now take the southwest branch, open the chest off to the right containing the Orihalcon, and climb up and Burst away the cracked post so you can head upstairs. You will return to the T-intersection north of the teleport pad. Once again proceed northwest from the T-intersection and pass under the rocks with Sand, and when you get back to the two pillars from earlier, this time go down the stairs left of them.

Battling monsters in the depths of Yampi Desert Cave.

Back downstairs, climb down the now-open ladder and note the clump of sand tiles where a self-animating mound of sand emerges and disappears in a regular pattern; if you attempt to inspect it, Felix will simply manifest a question mark icon. Position yourself and wait for the mound to briefly show up in front of Felix, and cast Scoop by either using a shoulder-button shortcut or bringing up the Psynergy menu with the Select button instead of the A button; doing so will initiate the battle with a Venus Djinni. Defeat it to add the Venus Djinni Crystal to your collection. All that aside, cast Pound on the wooden stake above you, then Move an earth pillar onto the sandy circular indentation southeast of it. Return upstairs without casting Retreat, since warping back to Yampi Desert outside will reset this and all other puzzles in Yampi Desert Cave.

Back upstairs, proceed northwest past the rolling pillars the same way as you did before. When you go down the stairwell at the north end of the dungeon, the earth pillar to your left will have remained one space below its default position thanks to your earlier handiwork, allowing you to hop left across it. Follow along the linear route, which makes you hop across the earth pillar you most recently fitted onto its respective sandy ground indentation, and enter the final chamber. The moment you get too close to the pink demon-like enemy, you will be brought into a boss battle with the optional Valukar boss, which can easily be dealt with by using summons against him with high-agility party members before he attempts to your own on-standby Djinn to use your own summons against you. Once you collect the summon tablet for Daedalus, you can safely cast Retreat to return to the exit to Yampi Desert outside.

Enemies

Bestiary of Yampi Desert Cave
Monster Name	LVL	HP	ATK	DEF	AGI	EXP	Coins	Weakness	Drop	Drop Rate
Fire Dragon	37	648	513	178	166	641	354		Atropos' Rod	1/128
Minos Knight	37	454	517	170	175	577	294		Riot Gloves	1/128
Sand Scorpion	37	259	457	185	147	366	207		Star Dust	1/64
Soul Army	37	356	508	207	156	586	299		Mythril Silver	1/128
Winged Lizard	37	337	452	160	202	467	212		Dragon Skin	1/64
Venus Djinni (Crystal) (unique)	36	990	309	97	280	1211	764			N/A
Valukar (boss)	47	12960	550	175	206	8702	4980			N/A

Enemy Formations

• Group 1: Sand Scorpion x1-2
• Group 2: Winged Lizard x1-2
• Group 3: Minos Knight x1, Sand Scorpion x0-1
• Group 4: Minos Knight x1, Winged Lizard x0-1
• Group 5: Soul Army x1, Sand Scorpion x1
• Group 6: Soul Army x1-3
• Group 7: Fire Dragon x1, Winged Lizard x1
• Group 8: Fire Dragon x1-2

Collectables

• Water of Life: In a chest in the first entrance screen of the cave that is before even the "main dungeon", before the teleport pad.
• Mythril Silver: Visibly half-buried in the ground to the upper left of where you enter one screen in particular. Retrieved with Scoop.
• Dark Matter: In a chest immediately visible to the left of the screen when you enter down into a screen from the screen above.
• Orihalcon: At a chest to the lower right of a screen near an elevated stairwell upstairs.
• Crystal: This Venus Djinni appears as a brown lump of sand that surfaces at predetermined spots in an area of sand at a regular pattern. To initiate the battle with the Djinni to earn it, bring up your Psynergy menu while the lump appears in the tile right in front of where you are facing, and cast Scoop to scoop up the Djinni out of the ground.
• Daedalus: This Summon tablet lies at the final room of the dungeon, guarded by the optional boss Valukar. Essentially, the dungeon's "main" goal and reward, following one of the main optional "superboss" battles of the game.