How to get Essence of Desire in Destiny 2

Essence of Desire is one of the major currencies in Destiny 2: Heresy, the third and final episode that wraps up the Light and Darkness saga. Along with other minor currencies, like Metastasized Essentia, you’ll use the Essence of Desire to get yourself some powerful new loot so you can take on The Taken King once again. In this Destiny 2 guide, we’ll walk you through what Essence of Desire does, how you can find more, and where you can get Metastasized Essentia. Table of Contents What to use Essence of Desire for in Destiny 2 [Image: https://platform.polygon.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/02/Destiny-2-Screenshot-2025.02.06-14.48.22.28.png?quality=90&strip=all] Essence of Desire has two major functions in Heresy: fuel and keys. First up, Essence of Desire is the fuel for your Tome of Want in Destiny 2: Heresy. The Tome of Want will allow you to focus your loot drops. It can be focused to a category, like new Heresy weapons, or it can be focused more specifically, like on the episodic Watchful Eye machine gun. When you put the scriptures into the Tome of Want in order to select your desired loot piece, you’ll finish by putting Essence of Desire in at the end to activate it. If you don’t have enough Essence of Desire — and the cost differs based on the spell you’re evoking — you won’t be able to activate your Tome of Want at all. Second, you can spend Essence of Desire on bonus chests found inside the Dreadnaught. These chests are thinner than the normal chests inside the ship, and are modeled after the King’s Fall raid chests, if you’re familiar. When you encounter them, they’ll ask you to offer two Essence of Desire in order to open them. Doing so will net you a guaranteed Heresy weapon, some Sigil Shards, and a more general currency, like Enhancement Cores. How to get Essence of Desire in Destiny 2 [Image: https://platform.polygon.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/02/Destiny-2-Screenshot-2025.02.06-14.47.00.54.png?quality=90&strip=all] Essence of Desire is a general drop in Heresy, and you can get it from a few different places, including finishing playlist activities with your Tome of Want active, and completing activities inside the Dreadnaught. However, those passive methods pale in comparison to something the game never teaches you about: the altar in Eris’ apartment. Just to the left, along the wall inside Eris’ apartment, you’ll see a strange rock pillar with a Taken orb floating in the middle of it. When you walk up to it, it’ll ask you to offer Metastasized Essentia — if you have some — or tell you that you don’t have enough Metastasized Essentia, and that you require 10. If you offer up Metastasized Essentia to the pillar, it’ll consume the currency and you’ll get two reprised weapons from Season of Arrivals, some materials, and a whopping 10 Essence of Desire. The pillar sacrifice is by far the best and fastest method for getting Essence of Desire, but you’ll need to collect a lot of Metastasized Essentia to make it work — more on that below. Where to find Metastasized Essentia in Destiny 2 [Image: https://platform.polygon.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/02/vlcsnap-2025-02-06-15h17m54s359.png?quality=90&strip=all] Metastasized Essentia is the location currency for the Dreadnaught, Oryx’s massive flagship which has returned to the game as part of Heresy. It’s where you’ll spend most of your time this episode, and complete runs of The Nether, the roguelite mode that takes place in the familiar location (and puts a focus on healing). Like any other planetary resource, you’ll want to go to your Ghost and put on the Wombo Detector mod, which will allow you to see any resources and chests within 50 meters of your character. Just jump into the Dreadnaught with the mod on, follow the grey diamonds, and you’ll get plenty of chests and resources. However, you’ll notice that when you first pick up these resources they’ll be called Fleeting Metastasized Essentia, and are a slightly different color. If you leave the activity with any Fleeting Metastasized Essentia in your inventory, it’ll disappear and you won’t be able to use it at the pillar. To remove the “Fleeting” from your Metastasized Essentia, you just need to complete the run of The Nether that you’re doing. This is a mechanic to keep you from jumping into the Dreadnaught to grab two or three easily accessible Metastasized Essentia, backing out, heading back in, and doing that for hours on repeat. If you want your materials, you’ll have to finish out the run to get them.