Blood of Dawnwalker: How to Get the Polished Long Cleaver in the Prologue

The Polished Long Cleaver is the strongest weapon Coen can carry out of the prologue in The Blood of Dawnwalker, and it is buried in the ground east of Laslea Glen. Getting it means clearing a bandit hut for a treasure map, then killing a bear that has made a den on top of the dig site. The whole detour is worth planning around, because the prologue runs on a limited clock and every wrong turn burns daylight.

Quick answer: Take the eastward path out of the village, kill the bandits at the hut and grab the Treasure Map: Laslea Glen from the table inside, then travel further east to the bear cave, kill the bear, pick up the shovel by the mound of dirt at the cave mouth, and dig.

What the Polished Long Cleaver costs you in Time Segments

The prologue gives you eight pips on the Time Bar in the top right of the screen. Once they are gone, night falls, the Blood Mass begins, and every unfinished quest carrying a clock icon fails outright. That is the real price tag on any side objective here.

The good news is that the treasure hunt and the Dead Drop task attached to it are not time-sensitive, so neither one can be failed by the clock. They still eat two segments total. The first triggers the moment you approach the bandits’ hideout, and the second is spent digging up the chest.

Stage	Time cost
Approaching the bandit hut	1 Time Segment
Digging up the buried chest	1 Time Segment
Bear fight and looting the cave	No additional segment

Note: Save manually before you approach the hut and again before you enter the cave. Both fights can go badly at this level, and a reload costs you nothing on the Time Bar.

Coen walking uphill toward a shrine with the prologue quest tracker visible on the right — The prologue quest tracker sits alongside the Time Bar, which is the resource you are really spending out here. Image: Rebel Wolves

Where to find the Treasure Map: Laslea Glen

The map is sitting on a table inside a small house that bandits are in the middle of raiding. It becomes reachable once the main gate out of Laslea Glen is opened, and the route there is simple.

From the village, follow the path heading east. You are aiming for the bandit camp marked near Outlaw’s Gorge on the world map, so set a marker there if you want the route drawn for you.

Clear the bandits standing outside the cabin. They hit hard for how little you have levelled up, and one of them is a larger, slower mini-boss. Thin out the regular grunts first so you are not being flanked while you deal with him.

Parry the mini-boss rather than trading blows. Watch for the shield icon and block just before his swing lands, which opens him up for a few free hits before you need to go defensive again. Voracious Bite is also worth using here, since it damages an enemy and restores some of your health at the same time.

Head inside the cabin and pick up the Treasure Map: Laslea Glen from the table. Loot the rest of the room before you leave. There is a Broad Swing Manual here, along with Hunter’s Trousers, a Golden Earring and a Balm of Fortitude, and one of the bandits outside drops loot of his own.

Searching the interior of the bandit hut where the Laslea Glen treasure map sits on a table — Inside the raided hut, where the treasure map and the Broad Swing Manual are waiting. Image: Rebel Wolves

Open the map screen and examine the treasure map drawing. It points east of the hut, past the Outlaw’s Gorge shrine and then south. The drawing gives you no waypoint, so drop a custom marker on the spot yourself before you set off.

Pick Up Onion prompt over vegetables on a barn table during the prologue — Small pickups like this are scattered along the eastern path and cost no time to grab. Image: Rebel Wolves

Beating the bear at the dig site

The buried chest sits beside a forested cave, and a bear has claimed the area. It is manageable at prologue level as long as you respect one move.

Save when you arrive at the cave, then engage the bear. The quest HUD updates to tell you to defeat the bear and collect the loot, which confirms you are in the right place.

The bear encounter begins with the objective to defeat it and collect loot on screen — The objective changes to defeating the bear once you close in on the cave. Image: Rebel Wolves

Never stand in front of the bear when it winds up its unblockable frontal attack. That single move can take you out from around half health. Use Shadowstep to get behind it instead, which buys you several seconds of free damage while it turns back around.

Loot the bear’s remains once it goes down. You get Bear Fur, Bear Meat, Bear Liver and Animal Bones, all of which are useful crafting and cooking material later.

The Loot prompt highlighted on the dead bear's carcass after the fight — Looting the carcass yields bear fur, meat, liver and animal bones. Image: Rebel Wolves

Search the corpse lying nearby inside the cave. It holds a Long Falchion, a Level 2 Superior weapon with 55 DPS and a 33 to 45 damage range. It is a decent stopgap, and worth carrying even after you dig up the Cleaver.

Pick up the Shovel in the cave. If you cannot see it, switch to Focus Mode, which highlights both the shovel and the mound of dirt in yellow.

Walk to the dirt mound right by the cave entrance and dig. This is the second Time Segment the hunt spends, and the chest comes straight out of the ground.

Polished Long Cleaver stats and chest rewards

The chest contains the Polished Long Cleaver alongside 100 Denarius, a Recipe for Minor Fortitude Paste, and a piece of gold junk you can sell. The Cleaver is a Level 2 Master-rarity longsword and comfortably the best thing you can be swinging before the prologue ends.

Stat	Polished Long Cleaver	Long Falchion
Rarity	Master	Superior
Level	2	2
DPS	64–66	55
Damage	39–56	33–45
Bonus 1	+4.8% damage vs Supernatural Enemies	+10% Perfect Block Window
Bonus 2	+4.8% Activation Charge Restoration from Actions	+10% Activation Charge Restoration from Perfect Block
Bonus 3	+10% Activation Charge Restoration from Perfect Block	—

The bonus damage against supernatural enemies is the part that matters most in the hours after the prologue, since that is exactly what you spend them fighting. The Cleaver holds up until roughly Level 12 or 13, at which point the legendary Durandal becomes the obvious upgrade.

Confirming you got it, and why the dig might not trigger

You have it when the loot window lists the Polished Long Cleaver, the Denarius and the Recipe for Minor Fortitude Paste together after digging. Open your inventory and equip the Cleaver right away, because the game does not swap your weapon automatically and it is easy to walk off still holding a starter blade.

If nothing happens when you reach the marked spot, the usual causes are short. You may not have picked up the shovel inside the cave, which is required for the dig prompt to appear. You may also be standing on the wrong patch of ground, since the dig site is the specific mound beside the cave entrance rather than the general area the map drawing circles. Focus Mode resolves both problems in a couple of seconds.

One last thing worth remembering before you commit. Two Time Segments is a quarter of your prologue day, and quests like Withering Away and Blasphemy carry clock icons that will fail if you run the bar down. If you want the Cleaver and the cure for Coen’s mother, do the time-sensitive work first and treat the treasure hunt as the thing you spend your leftover daylight on.