The first time Coen crosses swords with Brencis, the Knyaz of Vale Sangora, is at the close of the prologue quest “Bad Blood” in a burning village. You are meant to lose. The game never makes Brencis invulnerable, though, and it never cuts the fight short with a scripted defeat, so a patient player with nothing but starting armour and a starting sword can grind his health bars down.
Quick answer: Beat Brencis in the prologue and he teleports you to Anachora, unlocking the Greifberg Castle region and the Realmwalker achievement, where you immediately fight his true form, Brencis, Grotesque Ascendant. Win that too and the game ends right there, roughly three hours in.
Why the prologue fight against Brencis can be won
Brencis is predictable once you learn his rhythm. His pressure comes from two unblockable attacks: a blood projectile he throws when he keeps his distance, and summoned blood weapons that slash at you when he closes in. Everything else can be parried, so the fight becomes a long test of timing rather than a damage race.
The problem is arithmetic. Coen is severely underlevelled at this point, has almost no abilities unlocked, and his starter sword chips away at very large health bars. Expect a slow encounter where a single serious mistake ends the attempt. Publisher Bandai Namco has confirmed the route is real but brutal, noting that finishing the game at the end of the prologue is a possible ending if you are good enough, while adding that it is extremely hard to actually pull off. Only a handful of the studio’s own developers have managed it.
What triggers the moment Brencis’ first form drops
Emptying the first health bar plays a cutscene rather than a victory screen. Brencis is knocked back, crawls across the ground, calls Coen an insolent mongrel, and casts a spell instead of dying. You are then pulled into Anachora, the hellish vampiric afterlife, arriving in a ruined, crimson-lit landscape under a red sky.
Two things register immediately. A “New Region Discovered” prompt awards you Greifberg Castle, the location where the climactic fight normally takes place dozens of hours later, and the Realmwalker achievement pops for setting foot in Anachora for the first time. If neither of those appears, the fight did not actually end and you are still in the village.
| Trigger | Result |
|---|---|
| First health bar emptied | Cutscene, spell cast, teleport to Anachora |
| Arrival in Anachora | Greifberg Castle unlocked, Realmwalker achievement |
| Second phase begins | Coen starts at full health against Brencis, Grotesque Ascendant |
| Second form defeated | Post-fight dialogue, then an early ending |
Brencis, Grotesque Ascendant: The second phase
Coen shouts for Brencis to show himself, and the vampire obliges. What rises out of the blood pool is his true form, a mutated shape trailing red vine-like appendages. This is the endgame boss, arriving after roughly three hours of play.
You start this phase with a full health bar, which is the only concession the game makes. Against an underlevelled Coen, a single connecting attack is enough to kill outright, even on Story difficulty. Winning means an effectively flawless run while you slowly sever his appendages and wear the health bar down. This half of the encounter is tuned for a fully levelled character, and it is where most attempts collapse.
The dialogue choice after Brencis falls
Killing the mutated form does not end things with a cut to credits. Brencis reacts with genuine disbelief, shouting that it is not possible and that Coen is nothing and no one. Coen’s reply is flat: yell all you want, it’s done.
You then pick between “Time you met your end.” and “Come with me. I invite you.” The second option spares him. A follow-up prompt lets you explain the decision with lines such as “You don’t deserve to rot here.”, “I want your powers.” or “To punish you.”
Because so little in-game time has passed, this version of the scene carries lines the normal confrontation does not. Brencis remarks on how recently he turned Coen and on the time he spent around Coen’s family, details that make no sense weeks later when the fight happens on schedule.
Which ending an early Brencis kill produces
There is no hidden eighth ending hiding behind this fight. The Blood of Dawnwalker has seven endings, and beating Brencis without any allies lines up with The Folk Hero, the outcome awarded for taking him down entirely on your own. The same ending is reachable later by breaking into Greifberg Castle and killing him without Lacra’s or Crake’s help.
Your family lands in broadly the same place as a normal completion. If you gave Esme the correct medicine during the prologue so she survived the Blood Mass, the whole family can come out of it alive. Parts of Coen’s epilogue are also written as though he had gone through the game’s progression systems, even though an early win means he never developed Witchcraft or much of a build.
Note: the 30 in-game day limit still governs the normal route. Ending the story in the prologue sidesteps it entirely, since almost no time has passed.
What you give up by finishing in the prologue
The cost is almost every character epilogue. Coen never meets or builds relationships with Anca, Lacra, Ocha, Vicho, Crake and the rest of the valley’s cast, so their questlines never advance far enough to generate their ending slides. The Court system, the side questlines, the day-night structure and the different ways of weakening Brencis all go unused.
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| Can Brencis be beaten in the prologue? | Yes, with starting gear |
| Is there an exclusive secret ending? | No |
| Does the game actually end? | Yes, it counts as a completion |
| Unique dialogue? | Yes, lines about how recently Coen was turned |
| Family outcome | Broadly the same as a normal run |
| Main loss | Companion questlines and epilogue slides |
Treat the early kill as a challenge run rather than a shortcut. Clearing Brencis’ human form is a genuine test of parry timing, and the Grotesque Ascendant phase is harder still with no upgrades behind you, but the reward is an ending you can also reach later with far more of Vale Sangora behind you. Keep a manual save before the fight if you want to try it and still return to the normal path afterwards.
