This location mainly serves as the introductory and tutorial destination for first-time players of the New Light free-to-play base game with a full questline, but it has also been utilized for seasonal content.

Players can have up to three active characters, one from each of the game's main classes: Titan, Hunter, and Warlock, each that has several subclasses based on the type of elemental damage they select prior to missions.

[6] A new raid mission, "Deep Stone Crypt", was released on November 21, 2020, during Season 12, and takes place in the Clovis Bray facility located on Europa, which is the birthplace of the Exos.

A node called Legends was added on the Destinations tab of the Director, which is where "Vault of Glass" is accessed from, and serves as the hub for any other legacy content that Bungie may unvault in the future.

A new six-player matchmade activity called "Override" was introduced and available on Europa, Earth's Moon, and the Tangled Shore, rotating between the destinations each week (one further one located in the Last City was added during the season's epilogue).

A new three-player dungeon, "Grasp of Avarice", which requires purchase of the pack, has Guardians exploring beyond the mouth of the "loot cave" in the Cosmodrome that had been present in the original Destiny.

At the end of Season of Arrivals, the Traveler reawakened to heal itself of its wounds incurred during The Red War three years ago to defend Earth from the encroaching Darkness—its Black Fleet of Pyramid ships had just consumed Io, Mars, Mercury, and Titan.

While on Jupiter's icy moon Europa, where the Darkness had invited the Guardian to discover an ancient power, the player's Ghost detects a distress call from Variks the Loyal, who was partly responsible for the Prison of Elders revolt that resulted in Cayde-6's death during Forsaken two years ago.

Just as she had provided aid to the Guardian against the Vex six years ago, she has returned to the present time to help prevent the Darkness from claiming victory and causing a second Collapse.

The Guardian is later contacted by Elsie, who has discovered that the remnants of House Salvation have located the fabled Deep Stone Crypt, a Clovis Bray facility that served as the birthplace of the Exos.

It is revealed that Clovis I combined Vex radiolarian fluid with concentrated Darkness to perfect the Exo program, cementing the link between mind and body, and achieving immortality for humanity.

In the aftermath of Taniks' defeat, the Guardian continues to work with Variks and Elsie as remnants of the Morning Star perpetually rain down onto the surface of Europa, hoping to stop any Fallen from salvaging the debris for their own ends.

Osiris was investigating the Scarlet Keep on Earth's Moon in his belief that Xivu Arath—the Hive God of War and youngest sister to Oryx, the Taken King and Savathûn, the Witch Queen—would take advantage of the chaos.

Over the next few weeks, the Guardian assists Crow in hunting various Fallen and Hive Wrathborn, namely Savek and HKD-1 on the Tangled Shore and Dul Arath and Xillox in the Dreaming City.

He said he thought about going off and exploring remote locations, like the planet Venus, but Osiris convinced him that he should come to the Tower, despite what others may think of him based on his previous life, and Crow proudly accepts himself as a Guardian.

(Hub for Emergency Logistics and Maneuvers) in the Tower, consisting of himself, Lord Saladin, Osiris, Crow (who wears a mask to hide his face), Amanda Holliday (providing air support and intel), and the Guardian to challenge various Cabal commanders—namely, Commander Dracus and Ixel, the Far-Reaching on Nessus, Basilius the Golem on Europa, and Val Ma'rag in Earth's Cosmodrome—and weaken Caiatl's forces to prevent her from gaining too much power.

Amid this offensive, a Vanguard communication is received from a Cabal ship, the Glykon, lingering out in the Reef, which had left Earth along with Emperor Calus' fleet when the Darkness arrived in the system, but had since gone off course.

After battling the Scorn and the Locus, the Guardian finds the remains of a Hunter named Katabasis (later revealed to be one of Calus' Shadows), and recovers his prized exotic scout rifle, the Dead Man's Tale, which they bring back to Zavala as part of their report.

The Guardian eventually finds the Crown of Sorrow itself hidden in a room below the remains of Katabasis, where Osiris makes arrangements for the Vanguard to extract the Hive artifact from the Glykon for containment, despite Caiatl's concerns about keeping it intact.

Ikora suggests the Guardian seek Mithrax, the Kell of House Light, who has been aiding Variks to evacuate Eliksni survivors from Europa from the Vex and the remains of Eramis' forces.

Still uncertain of his trust in humanity and the Vanguard, Mithrax offers to show the Guardian how to enter a Vex simulation as to distract them and steal key data, giving himself enough time to continue the Eliksni evacuation.

Over the weeks, the Guardians continue to tackle Vex simulations appearing on Europa, Earth's Moon, and the Tangled Shore, hack into their network and defeat the Subjugated Minds Tacitas, Portunos, and Thesmotae within them, slowly weakening the endless night shrouding the Last City.

It is also discovered that Savathûn, through Quria's control over the Vex network, is responsible for the endless night simulation, which has strengthened with Taken Blights appearing throughout the Tower and the Last City.

Meanwhile, Ikora finds that Lakshmi was killed and most of the Future War Cult members scattered, and that Dead Orbit and New Monarchy have left Earth, dismantling the factions within the Tower and the Last City.

They find Osiris in the presence of Mara Sov, Queen of the Awoken people, who had returned to the Dreaming City after failing to stop the arrival of the Black Fleet.

To aid in their battles with Xivu Arath's forces, Mara helps the Guardian relocate Ager's Scepter, a weapon created for Uldren from the same materials as the Compass but hidden away by him before he had become Crow.

The Guardian returns to the Dreaming City and fights through Xivu Arath's forces alongside Petra Venj and the Corsairs to reach the ritual site, where Mara, her Techeuns, as well as Saint-14 have gathered together with the entrapped Savathûn.

[23] To prepare for cross-play, some changes were made to weapons on the PC version of the game as a means of handicapping the intrinsic advantage of keyboard-and-mouse over console controllers, notably increasing the amount of recoil in many gun types.

[67] Destructoid remarked that the title mostly felt the same despite the new additions, and disliked the montentization baked into it, "After finishing the intro for Beyond Light's campaign, I was met with a gross “upgrade now!” stinger screen, asking me to pay for the deluxe edition and the season pass: this is for a $40 premium expansion with microtransactions.

[68] Kotaku felt that many locations were left behind due to weapon sunsetting, "Play Forsaken or Shadowkeep now and you'll only win obsolete gear (though both expansions currently still cost money).