Hey, so unless you’ve been living under a rock, a new game, “Hollow Knight: Silksong,” released. Have you heard of it? It’s absolutely awesome. It’s incredibly challenging, it doesn’t hold your hand, and it’s filled with tons of secrets and things you just kind of figure out. So today, we’ve got 10 things you didn’t know you could do in “Hollow Knight: Silksong.” Consider these kind of little tips, little secrets, little tricks. If you’re playing early in the game and you’re struggling, try pursuing some of these things. Anyway, let’s get started off with Number 10.
10. The Rosary Cannon: A Gun That Shoots Cash
The game introduces an array of powerful tools that Hornet can equip that give her just an extra edge. We found useful items like throwing spears or even grenades that pack a really powerful punch. But the weirdest secret tool we’ve found so far has to be the gun that shoots cash. This cannon shoots a rapid-fire spray of rosary beads like machine gun pellets. You load it with a totally unique menu interaction, and then you spray and pray with your hard-earned collected currency. It’s a ridiculous weapon. It’s one of the most impractical tools in the game. We need every bead we get to afford all the items and upgrades, but this weapon is fun to use. We had to try it out.
This rosary cannon is found in a secret room in the Citadel. In the lower level of the High Halls, there’s a room with a bench and an unlockable elevator. To the left of that room, there’s an interior doorway that leads to a machine that transforms rosary beads into strings. Basically, it’s a machine that turns your money into an item you can carry. But if you follow a secret passage that leads to a treasure chamber chest, then go down and find another secret passage through a breakable wall, then Hornet can access the area directly beneath that rosary vending machine. By smashing it, you’ll get the machine gun that shoots money that we mentioned. It’s a ridiculously secret weapon that’s also kind of impractical. Maybe there’s a reason for it, but we couldn’t figure it out. Look, if you’ve got extra money laying around, maybe it’s pretty powerful to use, but that’s up to you.
9. Bone Bottom’s Secret Event
Bone Bottom is the first settlement that you’ll find in the game, and it’s your best getaway for a very long time. Act One throws an entire wilderness for your bug to explore. And it isn’t a very welcoming place. Bone Bottom is kind of like your lifeline to civilization and NPCs. It’s got this, like, centralized location. It’s got the bench for resting. It’s a frequent stop in the earlier parts of the game when you’re wandering around. You’ll eventually unlock bigger towns and even your own private room, but Bone Bottom is one place where an actual unexpected event can happen.
So after repairing Bone Bottom in Act One, you’ll get a side quest to hunt a creature called the Skull Tyrant. This is an optional mini boss that Hornet has to track through the environment. Following its trail, you’ll eventually corner this monster in the Marrow area of the map. The boss isn’t especially difficult, making it a pretty good starting hunt for you, but that isn’t the end of the Skull Tyrant.
So defeating it gives you a key item. So you can turn it in at the Bone Bottom Quest Board, and that leads to another unique event that we weren’t prepared for. An unspecified time after beating up the Skull Tyrant, you’ll return to a peaceful Bone Bottom. Resting at the bench seems like a good way to save your game and relax, but a secret event can happen mid sit. So after using the bench, a new Skull Tyrant spawns and rampages through the town. It sends the citizens scattering, it tramples all the tents. The battle causes even more damage to the town, wrecking it completely. At least for the second round, Hornet doesn’t have to pay for repairs. The citizens will fix the place up for themselves this time and build a little statue in honor of a fallen citizen. There’s even a special funeral sequence. It’s a story event that will only happen if you actually keep going back to Bone Bottom. So we recommend revisiting everywhere often, ’cause you might not know what happens.
8. Get Caught to Unlock The Slab
One of our favorite secrets can only happen if you’re caught. So in Act Two, Hornet gains access to an area called the Citadel. This giant fortress is like its own mini Metroidvania in and of itself. And there’s one sequence that’s seemingly completely blocked off. The prison, called The Slab, can’t be accessed from the Citadel. There’s an entirely different way to get inside.
Back in Bellhart, there’s a new enemy nearby. At least for us, they appear there. So we’ve seen these enemies spawn in different locations, and it isn’t always clear what triggers their appearance, but we found one east from the town. Leaving Bellhart, you’ll enter Greymoor and find one of those bugs carrying cages. They’ll lunge at you and attempt to catch you, and if they do, you’ll actually be transported to an entirely different area.
Hornet wakes up in The Slab, the secret level, and with none of your gear available. Your sprite changes too. Hornet loses her cape and her weapon, so you can only perform weak little kicks to defend yourself. Now, The Slab is a special secret level because you’re trapped until you find a way out. The enemies are too tough to fight without your gear, so you’ll need to use traps to fight back, or you can run away from some fights altogether. The prison is a complicated area with multiple keys to collect, and it’s surprisingly difficult when you’re just stranded without all your useful stuff.
And The Slab leads to one of the toughest bosses we’ve seen. If you manage to find the Key of the Apostate in a totally different secret area called The Putrified Ducts, you can return to The Slab, then unlock doors to a new area, and reach a superboss called The First Sinner. This thing is seriously difficult, and you might want to save it for later in the game. If you thought the rest of the game was difficult, wait until you reach this guy.
7. Crest of the Beast: A Rally Mechanic
Speaking of “Bloodborne”, if you love the rally mechanic that gives you the ability to heal your hunter by attacking enemies, you can get that type of gameplay here with the Crest of the Beast. So in “Bloodborne”, your character has this brief window to retaliate after taking damage, where your attacks will actually leech back health. The Crest of the Beast here works in a similar way.
Instead of healing Hornet, when your silk spool is full, you’ll enter a special rally state where attacks will heal you per hit. One hit equals one heal, which is both dangerous and extremely useful. Using this crest can actually heal you more than the standard healing charge. And you can tank damage by healing yourself while getting hit, essentially nullifying some damage while the rally power is activated.
So Hornet can get her hands on this crest by defeating the Savage Beastfly optional boss in the Hunter’s March area. The creature is found in the eastern cave area and requires the Glide ability to float on a gust of wind. The boss itself is pretty hectic. You’ll need to dodge the charging fly and avoid the smaller little critters it spawns. Defeating it to allow Hornet to access a giant bug corpse that grants the Crest of the Beast. This new move set that gives you the claw attack that heals with each successful hit. It takes time to get used to, but early in Act One, the rally mechanic can be a game changer against bosses if you’re struggling.
6. Kratt’s Sauna and Free Healing
By rescuing a little creep named Kratt in “Silksong”, there’s a very silly secret cutscene that can occur with a useful benefit. So let’s start at the top. Kratt is a traveling NPC with his own sauna on a cart. But before you can hop into the sauna, you’ll need to save him. He’s located in a cave above the tavern in Greymoor. Finding him in the cave covered in webs, Hornet can cut him free and then send him back to the Flea Caravan in Act One.
So return there to that Caravan to find Kratt and his traveling little sauna cart. For a fee of 10 rosaries, he’ll let Hornet in. A dip in the water heals your masks and refills your silk. But if you wait too long, you’ll actually notice something odd. Sit in the sauna long enough, and Kratt will peek through the window at the top of the cart. If you jump and smack him, he’ll fly off. And talking to him after leaving, he’ll graciously offer to let you use the sauna for free from now on. So getting peeped on is a small price to pay for free benefits.
5. Unlocking the Whiteward
We’re skipping ahead to Act Two, where Hornet explores an enormous Citadel environment that’s full of locked doors and hard-to-reach mysteries. One of those mysteries we’ve already talked about here, that Slab prison, but the Whiteward area is different here. The White Key is found at the Songclave settlement that you’ll eventually unlock by ringing this giant bell. And returning to the Choral Chambers, you’ll actually be able to unlock the door to the Whiteward.
4. Injector Band: Faster Healing
This spooky hospital ward is packed with undead bugs that attack really wildly. It is not a pleasant place at all, but there is a benefit to exploring. At the very end of the Whiteward area, above the entrance to the Underworks, there’s a desk with an item called the Injector Band. Equip it to your crest to heal faster. Your binding skill, which of course heals Hornet, can be pretty slow, so making it pop out faster in the middle of combat is pretty essential. This single item is one of the best upgrades early on in the game, and you can easily miss it if you’re not exploring deep into the Whiteward, so pay attention.
3. Bellhart Housing and Customization
There is a custom player housing thing in “Silksong”, but you’ll have to pay up for it. After rescuing the citizens of Bellhart by defeating the Widow boss, you’ll be given the option to repair the town by donating a whole lot of rosary beads. And it isn’t just money. You’ll also need to donate shards.
Normally, donating to the towns doesn’t do much. There’s no clear reward for fixing up the other settlements in “Silksong”, but Bellhart actually rewards you for finishing up those repairs. Complete several wishes, and the head honcho will give Hornet a key to her very own house.
Now, the Hanging House is a bell-shaped building that looks way more comfy than the benches that you’ve been using for rest. Now, the local Needlesmith sells furniture for your house. You can buy all sorts of upgrades like a desk, new lights, Bell Lacquer for a shinier finish. We don’t know what all these upgrades are for or if they really do anything, but you can absolutely spend a lot of currency if you’re curious.
We bought all three of the house upgrades, and you’ll find relics stored on your shelf, but it still isn’t quite clear if there’s a tangible benefit here. Now, one cool detail we did discover is that Hornet has unique animations for opening the map while sitting down on a bench or laying in bed. She can even play her Needolin, a musical instrument we’ll talk about more below. While sitting, it has like a totally different animation. Small things, but just wanted to point it out.
2. Styx and the Needolin’s Hidden Powers
Here’s a weird one. Deep in the Sinner’s Road area, at the far southeast corner, there’s a character called Styx that Hornet will encounter for the first time. This guy instantly devotes himself to you, whether you like it or not, and it does have a secret benefit. He won’t move from his spot in the Sinner’s Road, but he will collect valuable items for you.
Return to the corner periodically, and Styx will have a captured Silkeater item for Hornet to take. Now, Silkeaters are consumables that allow Hornet to reclaim her husk, essentially, recollect her dropped stash and all the cash it dropped without actually traveling to the location. Like “Dark Souls” and other games like that, you know, you’ll drop all your currency whenever you die. You can either do a death run straight to your dropped stuff or use a Silkeater item. They’re normally very rare, but Styx will catch them for you.
There’s just one downside to this arrangement: Styx is located deep in a kind of out-of-the-way area, with no easy fast travel options and no reason to return for a chat. Like, there are no useful services out here and no hubs for rest. You’ll have to sprint to a very inconvenient spot to collect these rewards, and then sprint back out. But if you’re dying a lot and you’re losing your stuff, it might be worth it. And believe it or not, that walk to Styx hides another big secret.
To unlock the gate to the Citadel in Act One, Hornet needs to acquire the Needolin power. This key ability causes Hornet to play her sword like a musical instrument, and it seems to only have one function early in the game at least. You can use it to unlock the Citadel gate, and that’s about it.
Later in Act Two, it becomes even more essential, but you don’t have to progress that far to earn some use with the Needolin. You can use this power to unlock secret Weavenest early for some special upgrades. In Act One, there are strange doors with intricate metal detailing you may notice. There’s no lock, so it isn’t clear how to open these doors when you first find them. Using the Needolin ability causes these doors to glow and eventually unlock.
The first one we found worth mentioning early on is the Moss Grotto. The dimly lit advanced technology area has an unlockable map and a hidden lore character. The area is called Weavenest Atla, and by smashing through three breakable walls in a row, Hornet can talk to a strange character named Eva.
Eva does something very special. Periodically, she’ll upgrade your crests. It isn’t clear what criteria you have to meet to make her upgrade your stuff, but keep revisiting her as you make progress. She’ll upgrade crests to make them better and even give you an additional permanent slot for equipping items independent of Crest. That’s one of the most useful upgrades early on in the game. And this isn’t even the only Weavenest in Act One, so put that Needolin power to good use.
Another bonus secret that took us a minute to realize: the Needolin is used for more than just opening doors, if you want to know now. Playing the Needolin in certain secret spots will reveal hidden lore. Ghostly images of characters from the past will appear. Playing the Needolin also unlocks hidden interactions with certain characters. So if Styx is gone, playing the Needolin will summon him or cause him to sing a song. This trick works on a lot of NPCs in the game. Using the Needolin causes every character to break out in a song, and it even works on specific dead bodies. There are even more uses for the Needolin, we’re still learning, we’ll let you discover them for yourselves, but just keep an eye on things.
1. Bilewater, The Mist, and the Phantom Boss
The hidden Bilewater is one of the nastiest secret levels if you’re beginning your journey. It’s a classic Dark Souls-style poison swamp. There are even gross green explosive slime monsters and traps that are hard to see in the dark, and these dirty maggot-infested pools that prevent Hornet from healing.
The entrance is located in one of the most hated areas of the game so far. Sinner’s Road has a hidden passage that’s right near Styx, the guy we just talked about. On the vertical shaft leading to Styx, in the east of Sinner’s Road, there’s a breakable hidden wall on the right side. It can only be reached with the wall jump upgrade, so you’ll need to come back here later. But once you can access a secret area, you’ll have a very large, annoying dungeon to check out.
And things get much weirder the further you explore. Deep inside Bilewater, you’ll eventually reach a Bellway station. To the left of that station, there’s yet another secret breakable wall. This one is more than just a little secret path. It leads to another secret level that’s even stranger.
The Mist is a creepy, dreamlike world with ghostly enemies. The screaming phantoms are unlike anything else you’ve fought, and the enormous map here is filled with even more traps. It’s like a maze, and even if you fall, you’ll be forced to reset the zone from the start. It isn’t clear where to go, but you’ll have a clue. At the start of the level, glowing butterflies lead the way. By playing your Needolin power, the butterflies will fly in different directions, guiding you through this completely unique zone. Follow the butterflies to discover the truth behind one of the most mysterious areas of the game.
The Mist leads you to yet another new bizarre location called the Exhaust Organ, and this area just keeps getting deeper and deeper. It’s one of the most intriguing locations in the game, and it feels like it never stops. It leads to a super secret boss fight. And, you know, it’s hard to say no to a secret boss in these games.
Beating the boss here unlocks one of the biggest mechanics in the entire game. By exploring this area, which is itself a double secret area, you’ll encounter the Phantom boss. Beating the Phantom unlocks the Cross Stitch skill. This is your parry, and it has the potential to be a true game changer.
And that isn’t all you’ll find in this awful Bilewater area. There’s a truly diabolical climb up the region that’s full of barfing bugs and more traps and poison things. There’s even a bench that’s actually one big joke. The path is one of the longest without a bench in the game, and it leads you to a brutally difficult secret boss that unlocks a third secret called the Putrified Ducts.
Now, if you thought there wasn’t a way to sequence break this game, you were wrong. This optional path offers a different way into the Citadel, but it’s also one of the most challenging tricks in the game.
We know we’re only really scratching the surface, but these are some beginner tips and things to find that will help you get started. If you’re struggling, try these things out. Maybe you’ll start getting ahead and progressing even more and finding more secrets.
Let us know in the comments what you’re thinking of “Silksong”. You finished it already? Have you discovered other secrets? Let us know anything in the comments down below.