Genshin Impact End of the Line quest and Fantastic Compass puzzle

Genshin Impact End of the Line Fantastic Compass puzzle

(Image credit: MiHoYo)

The Genshin Impact End of the Line quest is part of Perilous Trail, the new Archon Quest. As you would expect, it’s a lengthy storyline with lots of dialogue, familiar faces, and… puzzles. Difficult, sapling-and-hidden-handles-filled puzzles. If you got stuck on the End of the Line Fantastic Compass puzzle, you’re not the only one. Don’t worry, no need to stay in that endless time loop forever; we’ve got a step-by-step walkthrough for the Perilous Trail quest and its puzzles below.

Perilous Trail quest walkthrough

Genshin Impact End of the Line Fantastic Compass — (Image credit: MiHoYo)

To start the End of the Line quest, you need to do the prerequisite sub quests in Perilous Trail. Here’s a quick walkthrough:

Go to the Underground Chasm and speak to Yanfei, Itto, and Kuki Shinobu.
Enter the Domain. Go through the hole in the ground, then through the gate.
The Chamber of Twisted Cranes Domain is quite short, but be ready to defeat some Geovishaps and a bunch of Pyro enemies. You need to use the rotation devices to make the blue stairs appear.
Talk to everyone, then set the in-game timer to 00:00 the next day.
After more cutscenes, enter the City of Hidden Runes Domain. Be ready to face some Geo Lawachurls, Mitachurls, and Geovishaps and make sure to bring a shield provider.

Perilous Trail puzzle: Danger All Around

After landing on the platform with the four runes (gold, purple, blue, and green), use the portals to reach the platforms above you. The process is the same for every group of runes:

First, light up the smaller runes by stepping on them. But beware: the ‘wrong’ ones will explode, dealing some damage to your character. You can memorize the correct ones, but it’s way easier and faster to put up a shield and try every rune you see.
Once you’ve lit up (or exploded) every rune, a group of Geo enemies will appear. Defeat them as you normally would.
Finally, solve the light beam puzzle: stand next to the beams and press ‘operate’ to start. Then move and rotate the two beams until they’re able to hit two runes simultaneously. See picture: the beams on the left are in the correct position, and the beams on the right only need to move a bit further to the lower right corner.

After talking to Xiao and opening the mysterious door, you find yourself alone on a different plane. Keep walking around until you see a blue glow, then interact with it to start the End of the Line.

Genshin Impact End of the Line walkthrough

To enter the Realm of Snaring Illusions Domain, go through the opening in the wall created by Itto. Since you’ll be playing with trial characters only, your choice of team doesn’t really matter. Best to bring some food though, especially revival dishes.

Right after entering the Domain, you need to defeat a group of Treasure Hoarders using Yelan only (as a trial character). There are six enemies in total, three per wave. Even though you can’t bring a healer or shield provider to this fight, remember those foods and potions if you need them.

After that, if you try going through the gate in the direction of the Fantastic Compass, you will find yourself stuck in a loop, moving endlessly between the first area and the small floating rock. To break free, you need to activate the Fantastic Compass that’s sticking out of the ground in the first area. Here’s a more detailed puzzle description.

Genshin Impact Fantastic Compass puzzle

To complete the Fantastic Compass puzzle, take the following steps:

Start by destroying the tree sapling next to the Fantastic Compass. After that, you’ll be able to interact with it.
Turn the needle forward just once, then go through the gate and defeat the enemies using Yanfei and Yelan as trial characters. You have to defeat two Fatui Skirmishers (Pyro and Cryo) and one Pyro Agent.
Before you leave, pull the lever next to the door opening, on the right side of the Fantastic Compass. Then move the needle as far to the right as possible and enter the gate. If the Compass is blocked, you still need to destroy that sapling in step one first.
This time, you will be playing as Xiao. However, instead of defeating the phantom, you simply need to avoid his attacks (watch out for the faint purple glow on the ground) for a while.
As you already pulled the lever, the gate to your right should be opened (if not, return to the second area, step three). There’s another Fantastic Compass here; turn the needle backwards as far as possible. The needle is now pointing to the lower left icon on the compass. As always, go through the gate.
After the dialogue, turn the needle backwards once (to the lower right icon) and, you’ve guessed it, pass through the gate again.

Complete Perilous Trail in Genshin Impact

And that concludes the Fantastic Compass puzzle. You will find yourself in a completely empty space, where you must follow the image of the lost sibling until the next Fantastic Compass appears. This will trigger a cutscene, and eventually complete the End of the Line quest.

The final part of Perilous Trail consists of dialogue only. Speak to Kuki Shinobu, sit back, relax, and enjoy the final cutscenes!