Editing Ezio Auditore da Firenze (section)

==== Those who Came Before====
Entering the Vault, Ezio stood in shock as he was met by a hologram of a woman who called herself Minerva. He recognized the name and those of the colleagues she mentioned as belonging to Roman gods, but Minerva corrected him that her kind were mortals who had "simply [come] before". The hologram confounded him further by silencing him and then insisting that was speaking to another being through him even though he saw and felt no one else around. In the process, she confirmed that he was the prophet but one whose role had been completed by serving as the anchor for the other entity.

Her message commenced, and the the vault projected accompanying holographic images to present it. According to Minerva, humanity were created by her people, but they rebelled. In the midst of the war which followed, both the powerful creators and the more numerous humans were too distracted to defend the world against the calamity which fell from the skies and scorched the planet. In the aftermath, the few surviving humans and her species arduously rebuilt their civilization, but over millennia, her people faded away and became distant memories misunderstood as gods. Implying that there would be a re-occurrence of the catastrophe, Minerva gave instructions to find the "other temples" to save the planet. She closed her message with the name of her invisible recipient, Desmond, before disappearing abruptly and leaving Ezio with many unanswered questions.

When the Assassin exited the Vault, he found that Rodrigo was already gone but that the Staff of Eden had been left behind. Though he tried to retrieve it, it sank into the floor through an underlying mechanism and was locked down. At this moment, he was greeted by surprise by Mario from the top of the pit, for his uncle had arrived to assist. The two exited the vault to the clamorous rancor of priests in the chapel outside. Resistance from guards was mild and easily overcome as they left St. Peter's Basilica entirely. On top of a rooftop looking over the Tiber, Ezio prepared to drop the Apple of Eden into the river, but Mario noticed his hesitation and offered to take the Apple for safekeeping until he could feel more certain about the right decision. Ezio agreed and the two left for home with the Apple in the hands of his uncle.