Likely the reason that you braved the perilous Abyssal Woods, Midra’s Manse is a smaller legacy dungeon that has a more ominous, terrifying atmosphere. This is an optional dungeon and boss, but there’s interesting loot you won’t want to pass up, especially if you are interested in making any madness builds. The boss is also a challenging and fun fight. If you are feeling brave, let’s explore every nook and cranny of this macabre mansion.
Unique Rewards:
Nanaya’s Torch
Mad Craftsman’s Cookbook (3)
Revered Spirit Ash x2
Remembrance of the Lord of Frenzied Flame (boss drop)
You will need access to the Abyssal Woods to enter the manse. This area can be quite tricky, as several enemies require some stealth or parrying to get past. Once you’ve made it to the Divided Falls site of grace, then you go generally south towards the manse.
When you enter the mansion, you will immediately want to go right, and you’ll find some rare crafting materials in this room (image 1). Then, go up the stairs, and you’ll find the Manse Hall site of grace. You can explore this room and speak to the ghost, but there’s nothing else. The only door is locked; hit the painting to reveal the way forward (image 2).
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Past the painting, the way forward is linear, but there are some tough enemies. You’ll be in a hallway that has a side room off to the left. Inside the room is a Torn Diary Page and a group of easy enemies called Shadow Undead.
You can kill the enemies easily, then retrieve the diary page. The diary page isn’t an important item; it just explains that you can parry the Winter Lanterns (or “ageing untouchable”) in the Abyssal Woods. Also, on the eastern side of this room, you can scale the bookcases to find some more Swollen Grapes for crafting.
Wait for the Horned Warrior to come down the hallway outside this room, then sneak behind him and attack. You can’t do a critical backstab on him, so just use your strongest attack or spell. You’ve likely fought this type of enemy before, so you know to not take him lightly. It isn’t recommended to sneak past him, as he might come up behind you while you’re fighting other enemies.
You can get the jump on this Horned Warrior
Down the hall, you’ll come to a banquet room that has a big table in it surrounded by Shadow Undead. The only tricky part here is that there will be enemies above you, throwing Surging Frenzied Flame down at you. Don’t get close to these glowing rocks with projectiles shooting out of them, or your madness meter will go up. Kill all the easy enemies in this room, then when you go through the door in the southeast corner, you’ll fight another Horned Warrior.
There are some twisty passages in this next area. Around one corner, there is a Shadow Undead waiting to ambush you. If you run through the area, his attack will miss, and you can take him out. At the end of these corridors is a lever with which you need to interact.
After the lever is pulled, back track into the connecting corridor, and you will see a new room opened up in the southeast corner. Climb the ladder, then kill all the easy enemies hiding in this room, including the one that is right behind you at the top of the ladder. You’ll also see a ghost you can talk to and an item on some beams in this room — it is a Shadow Realm Rune [6]. Just make sure you killed all the easy enemies before speaking to the ghost or trying to grab the item.
In the hallway outside this room, there is another hidden enemy behind some boxes to your left. Kill him before he attacks you, or bait out his attack, then you can deal with the Shadow Undead that was throwing Surging Frenzied Flames at you from before. He will continue to throw the item at you, so it’s easiest to kill him with a ranged attack because he can’t throw the item very far. On the opposite wall, you will find some Surging Frenzied Flames of your own to use, then climb the ladder to continue.
This area is high up above the entryway of the mansion, with the Manse Hall site of grace below. You’ll obviously want to be careful not to fall off and redo the whole area you just covered. Down the way, you will see the Midra’s Library site of grace. It is best if you go straight to this site of grace and get the save point, before grabbing the Mad Craftsman’s Cookbook [3] in the side room. This room is full of rats and one giant rat. If you have an area of effect fire spell or item, those work very well against the rodents.
The area just past the site of grace will have an enemy directly to your right. This is a new type of enemy for the area, but you likely have encountered them before in the Abyssal Woods. They’re called Candle Inquisitors, and they’re pretty easy when not grouped up, just beware their fire and holy ranged attacks.
You can either jump across the tops of the bookcases to get some crafting materials and runes scattered around the library, or you can simply go down the ladder by the first enemy you killed (image 1). At the bottom of the ladder you’ll find some more inquisitors, and there is a passage along the east wall that unlocks the locked door to the Manse Hall site of grace. Also in this room is a large painting that is also an illusory wall. Hit it to reveal a set of stairs heading upward (image 2).
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Take the secret passage up to a lever. This lever will slide a bookcase in the library to where you can jump onto it (image 1). Continue this way, and you’ll see a large enemy below you and an area above it. Jump over to the area to loot the corpse and acquire Nanaya’s Torch (image 2). From this position, you can kill the big enemy below with ranged attacks, or you can jump down into the passage next to them. From this room, they can’t hit you, so you can hit them with melee attacks and roll back to safety. They’ll drop a Revered Spirit Ash.
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The next room will have one inquisitor and two hidden inquisitors that you’ll have to take out. First, kill the one on your immediate right, then deal with the other two. This makes them unable to group up on you (image 1). The next area will have the Second Floor Chamber site of grace, and to the north you will see a ladder you can kick down (to make a shortcut) and a chandelier you can jump onto to loot a Revered Spirit Ash (image 2). You want to kick the ladder down before jumping onto the chandelier so you can climb back up it.
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From the Second Floor Chamber site of grace, the corridor to the east will bring you to the boss fight. You will see a wailing man in a large room; approach him and he will attack you. After defeating him, you’ll enjoy a pleasant cutscene, then the boss fight will start in earnest. This is a challenging boss, so please use our boss guide below if you end up having trouble.
With the lord of the manse defeated, you have finished all there is to do in Midra’s Manse. It’s possible that you might have missed some things in the woods outside, so double-check our Abyssal Woods Walkthrough, before heading onto a new region.
Kelson is a spud head from out west. He is most happy when holding a milky tea with too much honey and playing a sprawling role playing game or reading a fantasy novel. His video game tastes vary but his main genres are looter shooters, RPGs, and real time strategy games.
