The Blood of Dawnwalker: How to Get the Medical Herbs From Anca

The prologue quest “Withering Away” hands Coen a simple-sounding errand during the morning: fetch stronger medicinal herbs from Anca before the Blood Mass. It sounds like a fetch quest, and it is — right up until you knock on Anca’s door and nobody answers. The herbs themselves are only half the problem. What you do with them afterward decides whether Coen’s mother, Esme, survives the ceremony.

Quick answer: Leave the village and head southwest into the forest to reach Anca’s Hut. If the door is locked, hold the Focus Mode button and inspect the half-watered vegetable patch and the empty barrel outside, then follow the path downhill to the riverbank to trigger the conversation and receive the herbs.

Before you leave: chores and your sword

The quest only opens up after Coen finishes his morning tasks. That means taking your clothes out of the storage chest, splitting logs for firewood, adding the firewood to the stove, and sitting through breakfast, where it becomes clear Esme is getting worse. Pieter then asks Coen to visit Anca.

Pick up Coen’s sword from the adjacent room and equip it before you walk out. It is easy to skip, and there is no reason to make the trip unarmed.

Anca’s Hut location: the route southwest from the village

Exit the kitchen and follow the dirt path down through the settlement. The objective marker sits well outside the houses, so keep moving rather than searching the village itself.

At the edge of the settlement, take the right-hand fork, then bear left into the treeline. You are heading southwest, away from the village, on a trail that runs downhill through the forest.

Coen running along a village dirt path with the Withering Away objective tracked on the HUD — Coen leaves the settlement and cuts southwest toward the forest trail with “Withering Away” tracked. Image: Rebel Wolves

Two tutorial pop-ups appear along the way, covering Time Progression and the Quest Journal. The Time Progression screen is worth reading, because quests and long conversations consume segments of the time bar, and Coen is on a clock for the rest of the game.

Time Progression tutorial overlay explaining the time bar and its segments — The Time Progression tutorial explains the time bar and how actions burn through its segments. Image: Rebel Wolves

Keep following the trail until the thatched hut appears in a clearing. A shrine is discovered here, and the location registers on your map as Anca’s Hut. Knock on the door — the prompt is there, but it reports back as Locked.

Coen approaching Anca's thatched hut in a forest clearing — Anca’s Hut, where the knock prompt returns “Locked” because she isn’t inside. Image: Rebel Wolves

Use Focus Mode on the two clues outside the hut

This is the game’s Focus Mode tutorial, and the quest will not progress until you use it. Hold the Focus Mode button to highlight interactive objects around the hut, then inspect both of the marked items.

Clue to inspect	What Coen concludes
Vegetable patch	“Half of the vegetable patch is watered.”
Water barrel	“The barrel’s empty.” She went to the river for water.

Forest area outside the hut with the objective updated to look for Anca — With both clues inspected, the objective updates to looking for Anca away from the hut. Image: Rebel Wolves

Find Anca at the riverbank and get the herbs

Walk around the side of the house and take the path running downhill. It leads to the riverbank, and reaching Anca triggers a cutscene — she startles, Coen apologizes, and the dialogue opens with two options that both lead to the same request for help.

Wooded path leading downhill toward the river while searching for Anca — The downhill path from the hut to the river, where the meeting with Anca triggers. Image: Rebel Wolves

Hanging back and watching her for a moment before speaking lets Coen notice the unusual marks on her hands earlier than he otherwise would. Back at the house, Anca hands over the medicine and asks for 50 denarii. If Coen can’t cover it, you can offer 25, and having no coin at all still works — she lets him settle up later.

Note: A storm rolls in after the transaction. Agreeing to wait it out with Anca costs 2 time segments and opens the optional Page-Turner quest; saying you need to leave costs 1 segment and sends you straight home.

Anca’s recipe: hot water and three spoonfuls of herbs

Once you have the herbs, the objective becomes “Bring the herbs back to Pieter and read the recipe from Anca.” Because handing the herbs over comes first, plenty of players never open the recipe and end up guessing at the preparation prompts. Anca’s instructions are short: brew three scoops with water that is hot, but not quite boiling, and give it to Esme before mass, then twice daily.

Back home, wait for Pieter to finish talking with Vladimir, give him the herbs, and Coen prepares the medicine himself. Two prompts appear, each with three options.

Prompt	Correct choice
Boiling water / hot water / cold water	Use Hot Water
One / two / three spoonfuls of herbs	Add three spoonfuls of herbs

How to confirm it worked, and what a wrong dose does

You will not get an immediate pass-or-fail message. Esme takes the medicine, Pieter invites Coen to train with a sword, and the Like Father, Like Son quest begins. The real check comes later at the Sacred Covenant chapel scene.

Spoilers for that ceremony follow. With hot water and three spoonfuls, Esme is still weak but lucid during the Mass. Brencis complains about her condition without acting on it, and she survives. Get either the temperature or the dose wrong and she stays lost in her own head, makes a scene, and is killed by the other Vrakhiri.

If you realize you picked wrong before the ceremony, the autosave is the fastest fix — reload the nearest save from just before the brewing prompts and choose again. It costs you a few minutes rather than a character.