Side Quest 4: The Moon Rose

This quest will likely be the most challenging for you but is one of the more fun ones as well so far.

Tip: Saving frequently during this quest is smart, for if you die at any point, it all has to be redone.

How To Start The Quest

If you talk to Lily the Innkeeper in dragonhead village after finishing Q6, she will say that Grimm has told her about dead rising in the cemetery. She will go on to say she doesn’t want her family graves to be desecrated and has heard of a rumor that there is a woman in the mystic woodland who knows how to perform a spell of sorts over the cemetery. She asks if you could investigate this for her.

To the Witch’s Cottage

After talking with her, you will want to head to the witch’s cottage in the woods. Mention to her that you were told she knows a way to slow the curse on the cemetery. She will ask you who told you such a thing. The only choice here is to say you rather not mention who told you (After all you don’t want the witch putting a curse on anyone)… She say she respects that just like she likes her privacy and its not so much a spell as Alchemy and Gardening. She will go on to tell you that in order to complete this, you will need to acquire widow sap and a moon rose. She explains that she can make a potion from the widow sap that will be used as part of this ritual but that widow sap is dangerous to obtain and it can only be obtained from a withering widow’s eggs.

After, asking her why she cannot do this task since she is powerful; she explains the spiders will be many around the eggs and it will be tight in a small area. So she is not interested in doing this and that you have to. When you ultimately accept to do this, she explains that there is an infested building in a near by basement just to the west of her cottage.

At the end of the conversation, she tells you to try not to die down there, as “she” is depending on you to do this as if she already knows who told you.

Before You Go to the Withering Widow Lair

You will want to buy lots and lots of cure potions. Healing potions will likely be needed as well. She conveniently sells both during the day.

You may want to consider picking up and raising Poison Resist as a skill before you complete this quest, it is possible to do so without it but it will be challenging.

At The Widow’s Lair

You will have to battle through a few small spiders to get down to the main lair, that shouldn’t be too difficult then once in the lair, you will need to work your way through the spider lair, collecting widow sap from the eggs. You will need 10x of it. The withering widows will have a much stronger poison than anything you have faced in the game. So aggressively use your cure and healing potions. I recommend stacking multiple layers of healing like regeneration and healing together works well.

If this wasn’t too difficult for your character, you can also choose to take on the Widow Queen spider deeper in the lair although its not required; the witch will purchase the legs from you for a high price. Note that you can do this outside of the quest as well, she will always purchase legs from respawn of the queen.

Once you have 10x Widow Sap, head back to the witch and tell her you returned with the sap. She will give you more details on obtaining the moon rose from the druids who are to the east at Myststone. She will ask you not to mention her involvement... You can head east through the forest, then follow the road slightly south and then to the east to get there.

At Myststone

Speak to the Thrice Born who will be out in the stone pillared area, you can go through his dialog for more back story on the game. He will explain how he came to be known as that… In the main dialog options, ask him for a moon rose, he will ask you how you came to know about the moon roses. Depending on how you tell him who told you will affect the help you get later in the quest. Based on your decision in the planting you may get help from Morganna, and her prodigy, the druids or a mix of both.

Please note: The thrice born is missing one area of spoken dialog and an updated dialog on another where the text isn’t consistent with what is spoken. I apologize for this and will address this in a future patch.

Return To Morganna

Once you have made up your mind go through the dialog; he will eventually let you have a rose, then return to Morganna with it. Depending on what you told the Thrice Born, Morganna’s dialog will change. Assuming you didn’t tell the thrice born of her or Lily’s involvement, she will reveal that Lily is her prodigy student and the moon rose was actually Lily’s idea. She will go on to tell you that she and lily will both be there when you plant the rose.

She will go on to explain that the rose must be planted and the potion applied during the midnight hour. This can be done during any midnight hour, it does not have to be that day or the next.

Preparing for the battle

So prepare yourself well with lots of healing supplies; If you do not have a magic weapon yet, you may want to consider purchasing one from the enchanter or having a weapon consecrated by the reverend though its not required; I recommend it as its useful against Ghost creatures which can only be hurt by magic spells or magic/consecrated weapons. One or two of these will spawn during the battle to come at the cemetery.

Planting The Rose

When your ready, you can head to the cemetery, wait for the midnight hour (12-1:00 is a good time to plant). You will need to plant the rose just above the large statue in the dirt patch (see below). Once the rose is planted, Morganna and Lily will teleport in (or depending on your choices you made earlier, you may have a druid and Morganna or just druids there).

Commence the Battle

Once they have arrived, apply the potion to the rose and the battle will immediately commence, you will notice dark magic projectiles flying across the cemetery at various locations spawning zombies and other undead horrors. Your battle partners whoever it may be will help you in the fight. Morganna and Lily are the strongest partners you can have however the druids will help you stay healed.

The battle will be chaotic so try to keep yourself healed and fight off whatever you can. Stay alive till dawn and you will succeed at the quest. Morganna will conclude it in saying “There it is done”.

Note: Completing this quest actually does stop the spawn in the cemetery of undead (at least for now) however the crypts will still continue to be plagued by darkness and undead. The ritual only has a limited effect.