Ascent

The **Ascent** is a special sequence begun by obtaining  from the special versions of the Mausoleum/Gehenna II. These floors can be accessed by opening the special door in the starting room of the Depths II or its variants. This door appears once Isaac has defeated Mother at least once. It involves going back up through abbreviated versions of every floor previously seen through beams of light. Much like the  Backasswards challenge, Isaac begins in the boss room of each floor and must find the beam of light, located in the corresponding starting room.

These abbreviated versions contain the same Treasure Rooms and Boss Rooms as they did previously, in almost the same condition.

* Any Trinkets left behind in these rooms, however, will each be transformed into a .

All the other special rooms do not spawn.

* Special Red Rooms still have the normal chance to be generated.

Monsters not normally found on the current floor will appear, as well as unique room layouts and new monsters not found anywhere else in the game.

After leaving the Mausoleum II, Isaac will begin taking full heart damage, as would otherwise occur on entering any variant of the Womb or the Corpse.

Entering the Basement I's light beam will take Isaac to Home.

## Unique Monsters

This table lists all of the unique monsters that only spawn during the ascent. These enemies are based on normal enemies from the individual pre-ascent chapters they are seen in, but are far tougher.

## Regular Monsters

When the game makes a small mock floor to take the place of each original floor/chapter Isaac descended through before the ascent, it populates each new floor mostly with its pre-ascent chapter-specific enemies. However, the Ascent enemy pools are altered to allow enemies from later floors.

These are the tables of enemies the game spawns to populate its specific ascent mock chapters.

### Depths

*Degraded Bosses:*

 The Haunt | 260.0

### Caves

*Degraded Bosses:*

 The Hollow | 19.1
 Larry Jr. | 19.0

### Basement

*Degraded Bosses:*

 Dingle | 261.0
 The Duke of Flies | 67.0
 Gemini | 79.0
 Gish | 43.1
 The Husk | 67.1
 Mega Fatty | 264.0
 Monstro | 20.0
 Steven | 79.1
 Widow | 100.0

## Notes

* If any variant floors were encountered during descent, all floors of the Ascent will still be the original ones. For example, if the second floor on a run was the Cellar II or the Burning Basement II, during the Ascent, it will be replaced by the Basement II regardless. This includes alternate chapters, such as Downpour, and so on.
	+ However, it's still possible to access them through the use of Debug Console.
* Isaac won't encounter any curses during the Ascent, except Curse of the Labyrinth if it was on the original floor.
	+ When encountering Curse of the Blind, it may be a good idea to skip boss and treasure room items, as they will be revealed during the Ascent.
	+ XL floors in the Ascent will contain both Treasure Rooms from the original floor.
* Red Treasure Rooms found through the  during the original run will automatically show up during the Ascent, and will be adjacent to normal rooms. These doors do not require keys to open.
* Any unopened Treasure Rooms on previous floors will still be locked during the Ascent.
	+ If these skipped Treasure Rooms are entered during the ascent, they will contain different items. This is best viewed with the effect of .
	+ This also means a strategy is to skip Treasure Rooms early in a run to spawn a Planetarium, and then get the skipped Treasure Room items during the Ascent. However, there's no need to keep doing it after encountering a Planetarium, since the probability to encounter it will stay at 1%.
* Angel Rooms and Devil Rooms will have different contents than on the original path.
	+ Since the Boss Rooms have already been cleared during descent, Devil Rooms and Angel Rooms won't open during the Ascent, and can only be accessed with teleport effects.
	+ The special Angel Room Shops generated by  will also have different contents.
* During the Ascent, both items in a double item Treasure Room are visible.
* Items and trinkets that activate on entering the floor, such as , will trigger each time Isaac ascends a floor.
* If attempting to produce a ,  should be avoided before successfully leaving a floor with a trinket placed in a Boss Room or Treasure Room. The effect can move trinkets from previous floors into the starting room of the next floor.
	+ will work on the Ascent, and can be used to bring an additional pickup if holding a .
* has some altered effects during the Ascent.
	+ If a boss item became a Devil Deal on the way down and it was not taken, the same item will still be there on the way up but will now cost money instead of heart containers.
	+ If used during the Ascent, Boss Rooms that have already given normal pedestal item drops will contain Devil Deals regardless.
* In each floor, after exploring all normal rooms, using  will teleport Isaac to the Angel Room/Devil Room, since Secret Rooms and Super Secret Rooms will not spawn.
* If a floor is restarted, which can be accomplished through using  or by finding a Red 5-pip Dice Room, the following effects will happen:
	+ No dream animations will be shown when restarting.
	+ The regenerated floor will still be a Ascent floor, not a descent floor.
	+ If the floor was an XL one, the regenerated floor will also be XL.
	+ If the Treasure Room was skipped during descent, and during the Ascent its contents were seen, after restarting it will contain different items.
	+ All s in either the Boss Room or the Treasure Room will remain there, even if they were used before restarting.
* The I AM ERROR room can be reached during the ascent. I AM ERROR rooms will mimic the layout that they had corresponding to the floor. Rather than containing a trapdoor, they will contain a beam of light leading up to the next floor.
* Entering an I AM ERROR room in Gehenna II (before the Ascent) takes Isaac to the Womb II.
* No consumable voice lines will be spoken during the Ascent.
* Jacob and Esau will overlap one other when ascending to a new floor. This effect stops upon pressing the Swap key or entering a new room.
* During the descent, it is recommended to leave any abandoned Trinkets in Treasure Rooms or Boss Rooms, so that the resulting s can be used during the Ascent, which could potentially create special rooms containing items or other useful pickups.
* If the Boss Music would play, it plays the Boss Music for the alternate path rather than the Boss Music for the main path. One way to make Boss Music play is to find an Angel Room by using a /.
* If a Boss is not fought during the descent, the Boss Room will still be empty during the Ascent.

## Dialogue

At various points during the Ascent, arguments between Isaac's parents can be heard, shedding some light on the fractured state of Isaac's family.

* **Mom:** "What do you mean? What do you mean it's gone? *How could you have spent our savings?!*"
* **Dad:** "**Shut up, Maggy! SHUT! UP!** You just keep pushing me like this, I'm leaving!"
* **Mom:** "Good! **LEAVE!** We'll be fine without you! *Abandon us like you've abandoned yourself...*"
* **Dad:** "You. Are. INSANE. You are taking this too far. Can't you hear how you sound!?"
* **Mom:** *"Pray with me...* Pray for your salvation! *Come, pray with us, Isaac...*"
* **Mom:** "Where are you going?! Wait! We need you! Your son **NEEDS** you!"
* **Dad:** "I'm doing more harm than good. I just can't do this anymore. I'm sorry."
* **Mom:** "*PLEASE...!* **PLEASE DON'T LEAVE US...!**"
* **Dad:** "*I'm sorry, Isaac...*"

## Trivia

* The Ascent is referred to as "backwards" in the sequence's rooms file.
* Great Gideon can be seen in its boss room during the Ascent. However, since he was already defeated on the way down, he will be deactivated.
	+ Even if he was encountered in the Ashpit during the normal descent, he will still appear in the Mines during the Ascent.
* What sounds like a reversed version of Genesis Retake Light can be heard playing during the Ascent, and as the ascent progresses, more instruments are added to it based on the floors Isaac ascends through.
	+ The Mausoleum adds a crunchy, electric bass line.
	+ The Depths adds occasional guitar riffs and a unique composition.
	+ The Mines adds a drum line and metal clanking sounds.
	+ The Caves adds a standard bass line.
	+ Downpour adds a fuller guitar line with an echo effect.
	+ The Basement adds a full percussion line with a standard drum set.