Bloodborne Quest Guide: Every Side Quest, NPC Location, and Reward

Bloodborne hides some of its best rewards behind doors that only open once. Talk to the wrong NPC too late, push a boss too early, or take one blood vial too many, and an entire storyline quietly disappears — often without a single warning. That is why a reliable Bloodborne quest guide matters more here than in most action RPGs: the game never tells you a quest exists, and it almost never tells you that you failed one.

This Bloodborne quest guide walks through how side quests trigger, which NPCs can be recruited, where each survivor should be sent, and the small decisions that decide whether you walk away with a Crow Hunter Badge or an empty quest log. No lore digressions — just the order of operations.

How Bloodborne Side Quests Actually Work

Bloodborne never hands you a quest log. Side quests are optional objectives that switch on when a specific event happens — a boss dies, a gate opens, a lantern is lit — and most of them switch off again at the next story gate. Players who treat NPC dialogue as flavor text usually finish the game with half the questlines silently closed.

The world moves through phases: evening in Central Yharnam, night after Vicar Amelia, and the Blood Moon that rises after Rom, the Vacuous Spider. Each phase rewrites who is standing where and which windows still answer when you knock.

The practical takeaway: after every major boss, do a lap of your known NPCs before you move on. That single habit is worth more than any checklist — and it is the core habit this Bloodborne quest guide is built around.

The Opening Quests: Gilbert and Eileen

Your first two threads start within a few minutes of the first lantern. Gilbert speaks through a window near the Central Yharnam lamp; keep talking to him every time you pass, and he hands over the Flamesprayer along with early hints about the hunt. His story ends badly no matter what you do, but his gift is one of the easiest early upgrades to miss.

Eileen the Crow is the opposite: miss her and you lose one of the best questlines in the game. She waits on the rafters above the barrel-filled building near the Lonely Old Woman's house in Central Yharnam. She is not hostile, so do not swing first.

Eileen's route is the one that trips people up, so treat it as a sequence:

1. Talk to her in Central Yharnam and accept her warning.
2. After Cathedral Ward opens, find her just outside Oedon Chapel and exhaust her dialogue.
3. When she asks for help at the Tomb of Oedon, join the fight against Henryk — and keep her alive. If she dies, or if you hit her, the questline ends.
4. Late in the game, return to the Grand Cathedral. Defeat the Bloody Crow of Cainhurst with her still standing, and she rewards you.

Community reports note a sting in the tail: if Eileen survives the Grand Cathedral duel, she hands over the Crow Hunter Badge and the Hunter oath rune; if she dies there, you can still loot the badge from her body but lose the rune.

Survivor Rescues: Who Goes Where

Once Oedon Chapel becomes a refuge, you gain a choice that defines most of Bloodborne's NPC content: send survivors to the chapel or to Iosefka's Clinic. The chapel keeps people alive and generous. The clinic is a trap — Iosefka's "treatment" turns almost everyone into a hostile celestial, and you lose their rewards permanently.

The Skeptical Man adds a wrinkle. He sits across from Arianna's window and does the exact opposite of whatever you suggest, so tell him to go to the clinic if you want him at the chapel. He also refuses to move until Arianna has already left.

Arianna will only agree to move once you have killed the Blood-starved Beast, Vicar Amelia, or the Witch of Hemwick, and the Skeptical Man only follows her lead. One more warning that experienced players pass around: the Suspicious Beggar from the Forbidden Woods should never be sent to Oedon Chapel, because he murders the other survivors.

Arianna, Adella, and the Umbilical Cord

Arianna is the most consequential survivor, and the most fragile. Her blood is a powerful heal, but accepting it more than twice triggers Adella's jealousy — the nun quietly kills Arianna, and with her goes the One Third of Umbilical Cord. Three umbilical cords are required for the true final boss encounter, so this is one of the few "optional" choices that directly gates an ending.

After the Blood Moon rises, Arianna relocates to the sewer beneath Oedon Chapel. Find her there, deal with what she has given birth to, and claim the One Third of Umbilical Cord. A Bloodborne quest guide that skips this step leaves you locked out of the Moon Presence fight entirely.

A Practical Quest Order and the Mistakes That Break It

Here is the route most Bloodborne quest guide veterans follow, condensed into a single pass. It keeps every window open without forcing you to backtrack across Yharnam twice.

Five mistakes end more quests than any boss:

• Attacking NPCs. One stray swing at Eileen or Adella turns them permanently hostile and closes their content.
• Sending anyone to Iosefka's Clinic. Survivors become celestial enemies, not allies.
• Taking Arianna's blood three times. Adella kills her, and the umbilical cord is gone.
• Rushing bosses. Every phase change in the night moves or removes an NPC.
• Skipping the church outfit. Adella will not leave Hypogean Gaol if you show up in the wrong garb.

A Bloodborne quest guide is only as good as your patience with dialogue: exhaust every conversation until the lines repeat, then move on.

FAQ

Can you permanently fail a quest in Bloodborne? Yes. Most questlines close at fixed story gates, and hostile actions are irreversible without a new playthrough or a save backup. That is why this Bloodborne quest guide emphasizes order over speed.

Should I send survivors to Oedon Chapel or Iosefka's Clinic? Oedon Chapel, with one exception: the Skeptical Man, who needs the opposite instruction to end up there. The clinic turns survivors into enemies.

Does this Bloodborne quest guide cover The Old Hunters DLC? Only indirectly. The expansion adds its own NPC threads and rewards that follow different rules, so treat the base-game route above as a separate checklist.

Do I need side quests to see the true ending? You need three One Third of Umbilical Cord items, and one of them comes from Arianna's questline. The rest of the quests are optional, though the Crow Hunter Badge and the Flamesprayer make the hunt far less painful. For a broader look at the game, see Bloodborne on PlayStation.