I am hoping I have overlooked something and I can get a suggestion as to what to do next.

I have an O3DS XL. Started on 10.2 and I got all the way through Plailect's Guide all the way to Step 5, Section II or III. When I boot the 3DS WITHOUT an SDCard, it boots to the home screen. Settings says 2.1.0-4U. I have tried the 'troubleshooting suggestions', deleting the luma config file, checking that arm9loaderhax.bin is present, I've even tried the test payload when pressing "A" to see if it shuts off. It does not. Holding Start, Select, X, Y on boot all do NOTHING. Black screen (that I can see is lit, but black nonetheless).

I got the OTP.bin. The only thing during A9LH that didnt go perfect was going to dukesrg.github.io, it gave me a glitched screen. But I've had glitched screens before. I just pressed "Select" on the glitch screen, waited 15 secs, and pressed another button and the 3DS powered off.

My question is, what can I do from here? Can I go back up to a higher firmware and keep trying? I am so close but stuck on the step where you configure the Luma settings.

I've tried 2 differed SD Cards and 99% sure I put all the right files in all the right places.

Any suggestions would be welcome