There are a lot of different stages to the Black Ops 6 Zombies Citadelle des Morts main story Easter egg, but we’re going to guide you all the way through.
Many Black Ops 6 Zombies players will already know about the Liberty Falls and Terminus Easter eggs. If you have already completed those, it is lucky that another Zombies map dropped on December 5 with Season 1 Reloaded – Citadelle des Morts.
The ancient castle in Avalon is the latest place overrun by the undead and if you’re looking to tackle another challenging Easter egg, we’ve got you covered every step of the way.
Since the map was released, multiple writers on the Dexerto news desk have been playing through – from Ryan Lemay to Shane King, and myself. We tag-teamed the Easter egg through the night and had streams on in the background, trying our best to conquer the main story as quickly as we could. Below, we’re going to go through each of the stages included in the Easter egg, including some screenshots we took as it unfolded.
Activate the Pack-a-Punch machine
If you follow the tutorial at the very beginning, you will be able to activate the Pack-A-Punch machine, granting you access to a lab between Stamin-Up and the knight’s courtyard.
Speak to Krafft behind the wooden door in the Quick Revive room
Next, you need to go to the Dungeon area where you find the Quick Revive perk. In this room you will find a door and by interacting with it, Krafft will soon appear and the scene (above) will be triggered, starting a conversation.
You will know him when you see him… Those glasses aren’t something you see every day!
Unlock all Bastard Swords
Collect stamps from the bucket head zombies when they spawn
When you reach round 10 and over, you will start to notice a different type of zombies sprinting towards you… They are wearing buckets on their head!
Notice that they drop stamp items when you kill them? You need to collect the stamps with every kill, then take them to the four knight statues located in the dining room. You can cash in these stamps – almost like at the arcades – for four bastard swords. Obtaining all four will see the end of this stage of the Easter egg.
Upgrade all Wonder Weapon swords
That’s not the end of your journey with the swords. Next step: upgrading the swords into Wonder Weapons.
As seen in the screenshot above, there is a specific method to upgrading each of them and it can be a little time-consuming. If you need some help with the upgrades, here’s how to get all of the Wonder Weapon swords in Black Ops 6 Zombies.
Complete the undercroft wall puzzle
Now that you have obtained the Wonder Weapon upgraded swords, you are going to need to go back to the area where you spawn originally. In the tavern, there are six bottles there – each with a number on them: One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six. Only, they are in Roman numerals. Each of them have a different symbol and remembering them for the next stage is crucial.
If you go to the undercroft area past Stamin-Up, you can punch down part of the wall with Melee Macchiato there and by doing so, blue symbols will start appearing. They come at you fast, but you will need to fire at the symbols counting from one up to six, in order, to complete this part of the Easter egg.
Collect all incantations
There are four different incantations you will need to collect and they can be picked up in any order. We have screenshotted two of them above, so you know what to look out for. These incantations are as follows:
- Shadow
- Storm
- Light
- Fire
It can be quite the process to collect these if you’re starting from scratch, but our guide to get all Citadelle des Morts incantations should help you out.
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Collect the pages – then put in them in the book
Once you have the incantations, the next step is completing a pages puzzle. To get there, though, you need to collect pages for the book.
If you go back to the flooded basement for the symbols challenge, there is a wall next to where you fired down the symbols. Here you will find a book that has pages missing from it. Fear not, though, as finding them isn’t so difficult.
- Head over to the Stamin-Up room
- Locate the four torn pages (with red symbols on them)
- Collect all of the pages
- Return the pages to the book
After that, you will be presented with a puzzle to solve.
Complete the undercroft wall puzzle
The book puzzle will only start up if you have one or more incantations – but you should have those from following our order already. Now, all you need to do is start from the left (up and down) and then the right (up and down) Now check all of the Point of power traps around the map for those matching your symbols, when the trap is started wipe out zombies inside the trap until it ends early and the symbols are marked as complete. To check if you did it successfully return to the book and the red symbol should have faded to black.
Keep repeating this process until the four are cleared. Then, you can move on!
Salute the knights
Past Stamin-Up, you can go down one set of stairs to find a mural on the wall. Remember the order in which the four elements pop up, as you will need to use your incantation and inspect the right sword for each knight in the courtyard until it glows in front of you. This will signal you have used the right sword for the right knight, and saluted them. The Mystic Orb item will appear as a reward for this part of the Easter egg and this unlocks the next phase.
Fill the orb
There is a specific order you will need to follow for this next bit. To fill the orb, there are four different places you must visit – and they will be familiar if you remember the steps from the incantations task.
- Fire: Located outside the castle. To find it, turn right when you reach the red floor trap and it’s on the wall.
- Lightning: Go to the area you spawn in and turn left. It is near the first gate.
- Dark: Go back to the flooded basement again. Here, you will see it on the middle of the wall.
- Light: Go up the stairs near the golden circle and it is on the wall there, too.
Each time the orb has been placed down, you will need to interact with it so it changes color and a flood of zombies will appear and they will (as you would expect) need to be cleared to progress to each following location. You get kills that are relative to the location, so watch out for that. The Lion challenge is different though. For that one you need to stand in the green orbs that appear so that souls leave the green orb and make their way to the orb.
Eventually, you will be able to interact with the Orb again to progress but it does seem to be laggy for some players – as we have seen in our testing. Persevering isn’t easy on high rounds, either!
Once you have finished that part, take the Orb to the mural and set it down. This will spark a new cutscene where you can obtain a Guardian Key from the table.
Boss fight
To unlock the boss fight, take the Guardian Key back towards spawn and there is a fountain there. The fountain has the guardian inside it as a statue. When you use the Guardian Key, the Guardian comes to life and slams the ground – teleporting you to the boss arena where you have to take him on!
One trick we noticed was when The Guardian attempts to stomp you, it’s possible to deflect the attack with one of your swords. Otherwise, If you stick at it, dodge attacks, and keep firing at the big lump, you will complete the entire thing in no time.
Citadelle des Morts main quest rewards
- Jackknife Weaver Operator Skin
- Citadelle des Morts Calling Card
- 5,000 XP
The Calling Card can only be unlocked for completing the main quest before the Directed Mode releases – probably in the Season 2 update at the end of January 2025. This mode will guide you through the main quest, letting you unlock the Jackknife Weaver skin but not the exclusive Calling Card.
So, there you have it! If you’re one for spoilers, or got stuck at a certain point in the Easter egg, hopefully our guide has helped you in some way. For more Zombies content, check out our Black Ops 6 guides directory here and follow us @CharlieINTEL on Twitter/X.
