Castlevania: Belmont’s Curse opens in a burning Paris in 1499. Rose Belmont, Trevor’s daughter, works her way from the docks of the Seine down into the sewers and then up a burning prison tower. Paris Streets is the first region, and it is a large one. Most of its first stretch is a hunt for keys, and every key is held by a monster.
Quick answer: Part 1 takes Paris Streets to 68 percent. Beating The Fallen in the sewers and Joan on Prison Tower’s roof gives two of the three Catacombs keys and unlocks the Arcane Whip and Holy Light.
Paris Streets objective: three keys for the Catacombs gate
Trevor sets out to locate the bishop who called for him. Rose receives her mother’s tarot deck and a straightforward task: investigate Paris’s streets. Her mission soon becomes more specific. Far below, a sealed gate in the sewers opens into the Catacombs, but three slots in it are empty. Each requires a key carried by a separate guardian: The Fallen, The Warrior (Joan of Arc), and The Prophetess.
The tarot deck is the game’s quest log. Each Arcana card is tied to a major monster. Spirits scattered around the city give Clues that point to where that monster is and how to deal with it, and the Clues can be found in any order. Absorbing a beaten boss’s Arcana puts a new spell on the card. Part 1 fills two of the three key slots. The third, The Prophetess’s Key, belongs to Medusa in Holy Innocents’ Cemetery, the next region.
Rose starts with the Longsword, the Cursed Flame Arcana, and three Potions. Each Potion holds two heals, and the number you can carry can be adjusted under Gameplay in the Settings menu. Gaining a level adds one point to Attack and one to Defense. That is a small bump, so grinding is optional, though the respawning Zombies make it easy to pick up a level or two before the first boss.
Cursed Flame shoots a fireball that hurts whatever it touches. Its Works of Mercy act as small achievements, and finishing one purifies a Blessing that upgrades the spell. The first one asks for 20 hits with the spell. Its reward is a larger fireball that knocks targets back slightly. The second Work of Mercy stays hidden behind question marks.
The Relics menu also lists Family’s Grace from the opening, as part of the Midnight Edition. It is the locket that belonged to Rose’s mother. When Rose takes a hit while wearing it, the hit is blocked and every enemy nearby freezes. It then has a 60-second cooldown.
From the Bank of the River Seine to The Fallen’s lair
Control starts on the Bank of the River Seine. The basics are taught on the move here: jumping, attacking, casting, a longer held jump, wall-clinging, dropping through thin platforms, sliding, and healing. Every candle, lantern, and torch is worth breaking because they drop experience, mana, and sometimes items. Sliding gets more use than you might expect. It squeezes Rose through low gaps, takes her straight through enemies, and pulls her out of danger mid-fight.
Rose then enters the Sewers. Zombies, which keep respawning for a while, are the easiest way to work through Cursed Flame’s 20 hits. Skeleton Archers also show up here, and they aim well. The sewer section ends at a pile of bones with a lever above it. Rose wall-jumps up to the lever, and pulling it opens a gate into the Undercity.
The Undercity has hanging anchors and deadly water that Rose cannot deal with yet, so the route climbs into the Ruined Market. A Blue DEF UP book sits on a high platform there, out of reach for now. It is worth placing a map marker on it, since markers exist for exactly this kind of spot. The market also introduces sword-carrying Zombie Soldiers. They lunge and close distance quickly, so the safe answer is to dodge past them and hit them from behind. A glowing Virgin Mary Statue near the well gives a chunk of experience when destroyed. These statues are scattered across every area.
Above the well, a set of balconies leads to a fenced rooftop where the first spirit waits. Its broken line, “The monster… hunts for souls… tried to trap it… hid the lever… near the barrels…”, gives the Clue “A Lever for the Well” for The Fallen. The barrel room sits right below the rooftop. A cracked wall on its left side breaks open to show a wheel lever, and turning it opens the grate over the well. From there it is a long drop into the Central Sewer Drain.
At the bottom, the left door is blocked by debris. To the right, hitting a glowing white orb on a pillar opens a barred door, and behind it is the first Mirror of Life. Mirrors save the game, restore all health, and refill Potions. Using one also respawns roaming enemies, and death sends Rose back to the last mirror she touched. The Sewer Reservoir comes next. It has the map-marker tutorial, a gate lever, a shortcut lever leading back to the mirror, and a Red Book that Rose cannot reach until after the boss.
Path of the Rat is where Bats first appear. Clearing the cultists completes a Work of Mercy, and a breakable lower-left wall at the bottom of the descent hides Wall Meat. A second spirit gives the Clue “A Monster Terrorizes Paris”. It warns about the monster’s unholy cross and says a well-timed steel strike can break the cross while it is in the air. The objective then changes to stopping the monster, and the gate chamber is just ahead.
The Fallen boss fight at the Gate to the Catacombs
The Fallen drops into a chamber in front of the huge sealed gate and demands Rose’s soul. The game’s records list this boss as Leon, with The Fallen as his Arcana card and the Gate to the Catacombs as his district. He has a single red health bar, and the fight is mostly about reading his tells.
He mixes three-hit melee combos with a thrown cross that comes back to him. Once he reaches roughly half health, he adds whip attacks. Sliding works well against him. When he raises his weapon for a big swing or jumps into the air, Rose can slide underneath and hit his back. His ground pounds send out shockwaves that need to be dodged, not tanked. The cross can be hit out of the air with a weapon or spell, so it does not always have to be avoided. Regular hits refill mana between casts.
Emptying his health bar starts the Absorption phase. Holding the prompted button (R1 on PlayStation, E on PC) pulls in the Arcana, and the fight is over once The Fallen card appears. The card holds the Holy Cross spell. The Fallen’s Key drops at the same time, the first of the three needed for the Catacombs door.
Holy Cross launches a tainted cross that damages everything along its path. It returns after covering a fixed distance or striking a wall. Rose can equip it through the Equipment menu: select her current Arcana and replace it. After the fight, The Fallen briefly regains his mind. He reveals that two other guardians possess the remaining keys; The Warrior and The Prophetess are added to the deck, and the objective becomes unlocking the gate to the Catacombs.
Arcane Whip: what it does and what it opens
The exit to the right leads into the Abandoned Sewers. Rose runs into a wall she cannot climb, and The Fallen’s power, now channelled through her deck, unlocks the Arcane Whip. Rose aims and fires the whip at luminous anchors or at enemies, and it pulls her to places she could not reach before.
The whip has three behaviours:
- Round anchors: hold the button to swing like a pendulum. Holding it longer extends the swing so Rose can reach higher ledges.
- Sharpened anchors: a tap pulls Rose straight toward the anchor and across gaps.
- Enemies: hooking a distant foe yanks Rose into melee range.
The whip changes how the early sewers play almost immediately. A lever in the Sewer Reservoir drains the water lower down, and an Attack Up is hidden under a sewer platform. The anchors around the reservoir can now be crossed, the Red Book becomes reachable, and so does the Cestus. The route then goes over the Bridge of the Millers, where a crank turns the water wheel, and into the Court of Miracles. Rose finds a second Mirror of Life there, and the Burned District sits beyond it.
Burned District, Seer’s Hovel and the Prison Tower climb
A spirit on a bridge in the Burned District gives the Clue “The Warrior Is at the Top of the Tower”. Inside the Seer’s Hovel, a chest holds the Crypt Key relic. Whenever Rose opens a chest with it equipped, her health and mana refill completely, which is generous in a region with this many chests.
Prison Tower is built in layers. It has a lower section, the Guard Level, the Torture Level, the Upper Tower, and a carpenter’s workshop full of huge wooden gears. Rose finds the Cestus in a golden chest along the way. Its arrival brings up the Armoury menu and the weapon families system. Back down in the sewers, a drainage lever at the Sewer Entrance and a run through spinning saw blades in the Central Sewer Drain lead to a high chest. Inside is the Twilight Gem, which adds 30 percent damage for 7 seconds after Rose casts a spell.
Higher in the tower, the hazards include pendulum blades, spike corridors, and heavy hammer guards. A barricaded barracks ambush only opens once every guard is dead. A third Mirror of Life sits halfway up. Near the top, breakable blocks in the Upper Tower hide a Defense Up. A spirit there hands over the Carpenter’s Crane Sketch Clue, and a lift lever connects the mirror directly to the roof, so a failed boss attempt does not mean climbing the whole tower again.
Joan of Arc (The Warrior) on the Roof of the Tower
Joan waits on the Roof of the Tower. She is The Warrior, and her fight undoes what The Fallen taught. Sliding under her does not work. Her lunging thrusts need to be jumped over, and the opening comes during her recovery, when Rose can land behind her and attack.
In the second phase, Joan sets the arena floor on fire. Whip rings hang above the rooftop, and grappling them keeps Rose in the air and off the burning ground until she can strike again. Once Joan is absorbed, Rose gets The Warrior Arcana with the Infernal Pyre spell, The Warrior’s Key, and Joan’s own weapon, the Burnt Sword of Fierbois. It is a slow, hard-hitting blade whose special move is Blade Dive.
Holy Light and the second sweep of Paris Streets
Rose receives Holy Light on the Stairs to the Tower Roof. It is described as a gift from the Maid of Orléans. Holding the button creates a halo that breaks the black Chaos Shards blocking certain paths. A quick tap just before a hit lands performs a light parry and blocks the damage.
Chaos Shards are spread throughout the region, so Holy Light sends you back through places you have already visited. The trip back down the tower and across the city turns up the following:
- Wise Heart Fragment: behind a shard on the Torture Level.
- Obsidian Fang: Find it beyond a spike-filled chamber near the top of Prison Tower. Breaking an enemy’s guard makes it boost damage by 45 percent for 3 seconds.
- Shadow Veil: in the top roof chest of the Burned District, past a combat trial. It raises defence by 33 percent when Rose is below 33 percent health.
- Brave Heart Fragment #1: on an outside ledge of the tower.
- Attack Up: the reward for clearing an ambush in an abandoned house.
- Brave Heart Fragment #2: across swinging anchors in the Undercity, past its shard.
Every four Wise Heart Fragments permanently raise Rose’s maximum mana. Every four Brave Heart Fragments raise her maximum health. The upper rooftops of the Ruined Market add lore pages and a few more secret chests before the run reaches the Undercity’s Mirror of Life.
Paris Streets boss, spell and gear stats
These are the game’s own figures for the two guardians Rose fights in Part 1.
| Stat | The Fallen (Leon) | Joan |
|---|---|---|
| Arcana card |  The Fallen | The Warrior |
| District | Gate to the Catacombs | Roof of the Tower |
| Health | 800 | 1800 |
| Attack | 19 | 24 |
| XP | 400 | 600 |
| Rewards | Holy Cross, The Fallen’s Key | Infernal Pyre, The Warrior’s Key |
Both bosses share the same immunity list. They cannot be frozen, petrified, launched into the air, or slammed down. They are also immune to the Chains of Justice root and stun, the Chronomantic Dive slow, the Freezing Path link, and the Infernal Pyre launch. Joan’s record also lists a return appearance in Notre-Dame.
| Spell | Arcana card | Mana cost | Attack power |
|---|---|---|---|
 Cursed Flame | The Cursed | 30 | 25 |
 Holy Cross | The Fallen | 50 | 30 |
Holy Cross has three Works of Mercy. Each one unlocks a gift:
- Works of Mercy: collect 3 distinct whip-type weapons, defeat 5 enemies using one cross (they don’t have to be killed simultaneously), and take down 10 enemies with whip attacks.
- Gift: a second cross can be thrown.
- Gift: the cross does more damage the farther it travels from Rose.
- Gift: catching the returning cross refunds 10 percent of the spell’s mana cost for each enemy it hit, up to 60 percent.
| Stat | Longsword | Cestus |
|---|---|---|
| Weapon type | One-handed sword | Fists |
| ATK | 25 | 25 |
| Attack power | 20 | 12 |
| Mana per hit | 3 | 2 |
| Stagger power | 30 | 30 |
| Combo finisher | Dash through | Uppercut |
Both are tier 1, Ordinary-rarity weapons with the same stagger power. Longsword deals bonus damage on attacks made right after a backdash or slide, which suits the slide-heavy Fallen fight. Cestus starts with lower attack power but gets more damaging the more Rose keeps hitting.
| Relic | Where | Effect |
|---|---|---|
 Family’s Grace | Owned from the start | Blocks a hit, freezes nearby foes, 60s cooldown |
 Crypt Key | Seer’s Hovel chest | Full health and mana on opening a chest |
 Twilight Gem | High sewer chest | +30% damage for 7s after a spell |
 Obsidian Fang | Upper Prison Tower | +45% damage for 3s after a guard break |
 Shadow Veil | Burned District roof | +33% defence below 33% health |
Part 1 ends at the Undercity mirror with the Paris Streets map 68 percent complete. Two keys are in hand, along with the whip and Holy Light, and the remaining 32 percent waits on abilities Rose has not found yet. The final key, The Prophetess’s Key, is in Holy Innocents’ Cemetery with Medusa.
