Herald's Illusion: All Three Portal Locations Guide

What Is The Herald’s Illusion?

The Herald’s Illusion is a hidden quest tied to Leng Tu, one of the campaign’s major antagonists, and it is the gate in front of the Crimson Manor. The premise is strange even by Phantom Blade Zero standards: scattered across Wulin are three magic portals, each leading to the same eerie chamber where a construct called the Three-Eyed Puppet hangs from a hundred strings. Every portal you pass through opens one of its eyes, with Soul commenting each time. Open all three and the puppet wakes, speaks — and gives up its tongue. The key reward itself, and the Crimson Manor chain beyond it, is covered in our Puppet Tongue Key guide; this page is the full portal hunt: where each door is, what gates it, and what order the game actually allows.

How the Three Doors Work

AllThingsHow’s room-by-room breakdown clears up the biggest misconception: none of the three doors asks for a key or a code. Each magic door opens from its far side, from inside a secret room behind it — meaning the “puzzle” is never the door itself but reaching the chamber beyond it through ordinary region progression. The practical consequence: you cannot brute-force this quest early. Each portal sits behind a regional boss, so the doors effectively unlock in story order even though the quest log tracks them as a set of three.

Portal 1: Village of Lu — Puppet Testing Grounds

The first portal is the hardest to miss, and stepping through it is what starts the quest:

1. Follow the Village of Lu main objectives until you descend into the well — the route is in our Village of Lu walkthrough.
2. At the bottom, defeat Yuzan, No. 3 Musician Puppet. GameSpot’s notes: she is a Songstress variant who fires projectile orbs — block the blue and white ones to reflect them back at her, dodge the red ones, and fight against her vortex spell that drags you toward its center.
3. After the fight, talk to the nearby puppet NPCs, then check the tunnel leading to a cavernous area. A glowing magical doorway stands in the distance — GameRant notes it sits up a path to the left of the boss arena in the Puppet Testing Grounds.
4. Step through, interact with the hanging Three-Eyed Puppet, and its first eye opens.

Portal 2: Mandate Encampment — Training Grounds

The second portal waits at the far end of the Mandate Encampment, which has its own unlock chain — defeating Gu Wanyue in Pangzhen and looting the key beneath the well, detailed in our Mandate Encampment guide:

1. Enter the Encampment and push to the Training Grounds in the northern part of the map (GameRant says northwestern), grabbing the Training Grounds Key along the way.
2. Defeat Yubi, No. 21 Swordfighter Puppet at the large pavilion. She fights with wind and lightning, and her loot is excellent: the Baishan Stormswords, Memory Flowers, and a component for the Illusory Pipa — so this portal doubles up on quest progress.
3. Past the pavilion, the second portal leads back to the puppet’s chamber. Interact again and the second eye opens.

Portal 3: Mountain of Imprisonment — The Depths

The final door is in the seventh region, and it demands the most setup. The Mountain of Imprisonment only opens after you repair the Illusory Pipa and use it north of Meigu Lake — the parts hunt is in our Illusory Pipa parts guide:

1. Climb the mountain’s main objectives to the summit shrine and defeat the region boss Huangxing.
2. Claim the Flying Guillotine Phantom Edge, which interacts with mechanical dial devices.
3. Use the device inside Huangxing’s own lair — it opens a massive pit in the floor.
4. Platform down carefully, ledge by ledge, into the depths. At the bottom a cutscene triggers with Inanis — a familiar face GameSpot declines to spoil.
5. Look to the back of the chamber: a shining blue portal waits there. Step through, and the Three-Eyed Puppet opens its third eye.

The Reward — and Where It Leads

With the third eye open, the puppet speaks and drops two items: the Puppet’s Tongue — the ceramic key that opens the Crimson Manor beneath Weeping Creek Valley’s Sha-Chi tower — and the Crystal Puppet Eye (Yin), one half of a true-ending pair tracked in our Crystal Puppet Eyes guide. The puppet’s parting line points you onward: the Herald lives in the Crimson Manor. From here the chain continues into the Puppet Scavenger fight and the Perfect Ending route — see the Puppet Tongue Key guide for the manor itself and the all endings guide for how the eyes pay off. Note that this quest sits inside a broader arc that also asks for the Acolyte Masks, so expect the threads to converge late in the campaign.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I do the three portals in any order? Functionally no. The quest starts at the Village of Lu portal, and the other two sit behind the Mandate Encampment and Mountain of Imprisonment boss gates, which unlock in story order.

Why won’t the Mountain of Imprisonment open? You need the repaired Illusory Pipa to dispel the mist north of Meigu Lake first. Repair it with Myst in Pangzhen once you have all three components.

Is The Herald’s Illusion required for the true ending? Indirectly, yes — its Crystal Puppet Eye (Yin) and the Crimson Manor chain behind it feed the Perfect Ending requirements, so completionists should treat it as mandatory.

Sources: gamespot.com (Herald’s Illusion quest guide and Crimson Manor guide), gamerant.com (portal locations and Crimson Manor entry), allthings.how (three magic doors and Puppet’s Tongue), pcgamer.com (portal overview) — launch-week guides, October–November 2026.