The Boots of Springheel Jack

Fencing Requirement: 800 Gold

Head to Ganredhel's house in Cheydinhal for your next meeting with the Fox. He tells you to head to the Imperial City, where a man named Jakben lives. Note that upstairs in Ganredhels' house, you can find the Dance In Fire, Chapter I book, which will increase your Acrobatics skill by one.

Apparently Jakben is the latest descendent of Springheel Jak, a famous thief who died hundreds of years ago. Gray Fox needs the thief's boots for his master plan, but doesn't know where Jak was buried, so you're off to see if you can't find the burial site. Time for some graverobbing!

Tracking Down Imbel Head to the Imperial City and hit up a beggar for more info. Jakben Imbel has a house in the Talos Plaza district, keeps to himself, and only goes out after dark. (Vampire ahoy!) You can break into the house either during the day or during the night, honestly. If you go in during the day and brace Jakben, he'll offer up the key to the family crypts, which are under the house, in no time flat. (What a wuss! Maybe he's not a vampire after all.) In fact, this is the only way to enter the catacombs; if you enter at night, then Imbel won't be at home, and there don't appear to be any duplicate keys for the Catacombs.

Key in hand, head to the basement and find the entrance to the Catacombs. After entering, you'll come across...vampires! There should be three of them altogether, including a powerful Vampire Matriarch. Do your best to take them down without contracting the Vampire disease, then head into the tomb of Springheel Jak and open the chest. The boots aren't in there, but you will find a diary which, when read, reveals that Springheel Jak and Jakben Imbel are one and the same. And be sure to watch out...because he's right behind you!!!!!!!

Jakben does his best to finish you off, but even he can't stand up to your thieving prowess.

Not joking, either; Jakben will come down and start swinging away at you as soon as you open the crypt. As a vampire, he's fairly powerful, and he packs some nice levelled equipment, as well. Take him out as best you can, then grab Springheel Jak's boots off of his body. Done, and done.

This might be a good time to take off and adventure a bit before returning to the Gray Fox. The Boots of Springheel Jak aren't necessarily going to make the game any easier, but the ability to leap tall buildings in a single bound can lend some interesting aspects to dungeon crawling, especially for marksmen. You can often jump up onto ledges and other parts of the dungeon geometry to become unhittable by melee opponents, letting you snipe away without fear of getting pounded.

The Ultimate Heist

Much like the Ark of the Covenant, this powerful magical artifact is kept locked up in a basement.

Fencing Requirement: 1,000 Gold

Meet up with Gray Fox in Othrelo's house in the Elven Gardens district for your ultimate assignment. And it's a doozy! According to the Fox, you're to enter the Imperial Palace via the sewers, activate the Glass of Time, use the Arrow of Extrication to unlock a door, kill a priest, burn an Elder Scroll, fall to your death, then become reborn again as the Avatar of Azuna. Wait, that's not it...well, the whole plan is a bit beyond summarizing, so let's just get to work!

Stuff you'll probably want before you embark on this quest: Cure Disease potions (or the spell). Plenty of arrows, even if you haven't been using a bow thus far. Potions of Invisibility can be handy, especially if your sneak skill isn't very high. (We got through with a Sneak skill of 75 or so, plus the Ring of Khajiiti's constant Chameleon effect.)

Part One: Entering the Palace

The first segment of the heist is simple. Head to the Imperial Palace and take a left after entering. You'll come to the door to the Basement of the Palace before long, so sneak inside when no one's looking. Your compass will point you to the Glass of Time, a huge hourglass, so sneak past the single guard on patrol and activate it.

Part Two: Finding the Old Way

Make room for the undead, because there'll be plenty of them in the Old Way.

After sneaking back out of the Basement, make your way to the Arboretum district, where you should have a compass marker. Follow it to find the entrance to the South East Tunnel, which will take you into the Imperial Sewers. Make your way past those vicious rats once more until you reach the Beneath the Blood Works area, where you'll encounter undead and perhaps a Vampire or two. Unlock the door leading to the Palace Sewers and head inside. The journey to the Old Way is a relative short one.

When you reach the Old Way (which is more or less identical in feature to the dungeon you passed through at the beginning of the game), you'll have to start exploring a bit. You can just follow the markers on your compass, if you want, which will lead you on in the correct direction. Regardless, these are small, linear levels (despite the three doors that connect them), so make your way through them until you reach the Lost Catacombs.

Keep pressing through the Catacombs until you reach what appears to be an Ayleid Ruin. The jump that Gray Fox mentioned would be impossible without your Boots of Springheel Jak is here, on a broken set of steps along the northern side of the wall. Equip the boots, make the jump, then press both of the buttons up top to unlock the passage to the Hall of Epochs.