If a Tree Falls in a Forest… is one of the quieter side quests in The Blood of Dawnwalker, and it is easy to walk straight past. There is no quest giver standing around waiting for you. The whole thing starts with a corpse pinned under a fallen tree, and it ends with a short conversation in the village that costs you nothing.
Quick answer: Inspect the body under the downed tree near the Northern Foothills Shrine, use Focus Mode to follow the tracks until you reach the dead Uriash at the base of the cliff, loot the Orders: Patrol and Witch’s Pendant, then return to Laslea Centre and report to Zdislav. The quest ends there, and it costs 0 Time Segments.
If a Tree Falls in a Forest requirements, reward, and fail state
This is a zero-cost quest, which makes it one of the few things you can do in Vale Sangora without pushing the 30-day clock forward. There is one hard deadline attached to it, though.
| Detail | Value |
|---|---|
| Region | Laslea Glen / Northern Foothills |
| Quest giver | Corpse under the downed tree (inspect to trigger) |
| Requirement | Complete “All Good Things” |
| Fail state | Must be finished before “Sacred Covenant” |
| Time cost | 0 Time Segments (0 hours) |
| Reward | 100 XP, plus quest loot |
| Objectives | Follow the tracks; report your findings to Zdislav |
Because the quest is free in time terms and locks out once Sacred Covenant begins, the Prologue is the sensible window for it.
Starting location: The fallen tree near the Northern Foothills Shrine
Follow the tracks to the dead Uriash below the cliff
The trail is a linear breadcrumb sequence. Keep Focus Mode up between markers, because the gaps between them are wide enough that it is easy to lose the thread and wander off toward the riverbed.
| Item | Notes |
|---|---|
| Orders: Patrol | Read it — the note explains the patrol’s purpose |
| Witch’s Pendant | Superior Amulet |
| Mending Ointment | Two of them |
| Denarius | Loose coin from his pockets |
The orders are addressed to Sergeant Lubor and instruct him to comb the woods outside Laslea after reports of disturbing activity, unsettling sounds, and lights. Since you can hear the whispers yourself, the report was accurate. The patrol found what it was sent to find, which is also why none of them made it back.
The second location: The cave at the ancient ruins in the peat bogs
There is a second point of interest tied to the same stretch of bogland, at the ancient ruins southwest of the glen. It is a separate descent rather than part of the tracking trail, so you have to go looking for it.
Report your findings to Zdislav at Laslea Centre
He is not pleased, but he tells you to leave it with him. He plans to approach Brencis’s soldiers himself and make it clear the village had nothing to do with the deaths, which keeps the blame off Laslea Glen.
How to confirm the quest completed
When the conversation with Zdislav ends, the QUEST ENDED banner appears on screen and the 100 XP is credited. Check the hourglass icon while you are at it — this one consumes no Time Segments, so the day should not advance.
If the quest will not close out, there are only a few likely causes:
- You never inspected the body under the downed tree, so the quest was never registered.
- You reached the cliff but did not climb down and loot the Uriash, leaving the tracking objective open.
- You have already started Sacred Covenant, which locks the quest out permanently.
Note: keep the Witch’s Pendant rather than selling it on sight. It is a Superior Amulet, and amulets in Vale Sangora carry stat bonuses with a rarity indicator attached, so it is worth comparing against whatever Coen is wearing before it goes to a merchant.
For a quest with no time cost and no combat, it does a lot of quiet work. The whispers, the lights, and the soldier who ran off a cliff rather than turn around all point at something living under the peat bogs that the Brencis regime does not have a handle on either.
