Quick answer: The Crimson Forest Cellar Crank lies on the balcony of the poison-filled shrine hall, upstairs in the cabin next to the Cliffside Lodge bell. Climb the ladder by the bell, cross the hall, and grab it fast.
Where the Crimson Forest Cellar Crank is
In Chapter 1 of Phantom Blade Zero, head to the Crimson Forest to retrieve the crank. It is on level two of the large wooden cabin on the slope, a storehouse beside the Cliffside Lodge bell. The upper floor contains a shrine hall decorated with red hanging lanterns, candles, and shelves of clay jars. Check the floor beside the hall’s open balcony, where a wooden railing runs past scattered corpses. The crank gives off an orange glint.
How to get the Crimson Forest Cellar Crank
It opens into the shrine hall, and poison hits you as soon as you step inside.
Once you have it, head out the same way you came in.
Surviving the poison in the shrine hall
Entering the hall immediately triggers poison damage, which removes a large amount of health in a short time. A healing gourd only buys a few seconds before the poison takes the health away again. Leave the hall and the poison subsides, allowing your health to recover.
Don’t explore the hall. Walk straight to the glint, pick up the crank, and walk straight back out.
Crimson Forest Cellar Crank item card
When that card appears, the crank is yours. It is a Story Item, and its card reads:
“A tiger-headed crank found on the second floor of a mountain cabin in the Crimson Forest. Traces of toxic gas still linger in its socket.”
“Corpses lie strewn about, while mournful cries never cease… What secrets lie in the cellar beneath the ruined cabin?”
Don’t confuse it with the Crimson Forest Tunnel Crank. That’s a separate item in the same region.
What the Crimson Forest Cellar Crank opens
The crank fits into a circular mount on a tall metal box. The box is on the ground floor of the storehouse at the Cliffside Lodge bell, in the building where the crank lies on the poisoned upper floor. Go in through the west opening; the box is next to a rock pile and stacked clay jars. Move close enough for the E prompt to appear and press E. Soul sets the tiger-headed crank into the mount and gives it a turn.
Using the crank consumes it. A “CRIMSON FOREST CELLAR CRANK -1” notice appears in the lower-right corner, while the crank remains in the socket box. You can tell the mechanism worked when a torch-lit stairwell opens in the floor beside the socket, near the rock pile.
Step into that opening and follow the wooden stairs down through the dark. They pass a plank scaffold and end on the cellar floor, far below the storehouse.
At the bottom, move along the cellar until you reach an iron grille fence with a green haze behind it. Follow the grille for about 20 metres to a heap with an E prompt. It gives Remnant Dust +1,850, which is more than the smaller heaps on the slope outside. More on the currency is in the Remnant Dust guide.
Deeper inside, a pile on the grated floor holds Reflections: The Baishan Sect, listed under Books. Crates, wooden boards and an iron cage surround the area. The book recounts the collapse of the once-great Baishan Sect after Dugu Linghe wielded the power of Transcension at a succession ceremony. It also tells how Bi Taotao brought the survivors together to battle the Maskwalkers under the Three Pillars of Kunlun. The sect is also central to the Secrets of the Baishan tale, discussed alongside the game’s other tales.
