The Blood of Dawnwalker: Live Bait Side Quest Walkthrough

Live Bait is one of the short Prologue side quests in The Blood of Dawnwalker, and it doubles as the game’s practical introduction to Focus Mode. Coen walks his siblings down to the river, digs four hidden fishing rods out of a bush, and ends up face to face with one of Brencis’s soldiers. The whole thing runs on a single time segment if you play it efficiently.

Quick answer: Talk to Yanna on the road outside Coen’s house, follow her to the river northeast of the village, hold Focus Mode to loot all four fishing rods from the bush behind her, plant them at the four rock piles on the bank, then interact with a rod to bait the hooks. During the soldier’s questions, avoid every reply marked with a sword icon and the quest closes out with 250 XP.

Live Bait quest details, time cost, and rewards

Detail	Value
Quest type	Prologue side quest
Quest giver	Yanna
Starting location	Road outside Coen’s house, Laslea Centre
Available	Daytime, before the Sacred Covenant
Time cost	1 time segment (2 if you play tag)
Reward	250 XP
Missable	Yes

The XP payout is identical whether you fight the soldier or talk him down, and whether you play tag or not. The only thing your choices change is how much of the clock you spend.

How to start Live Bait outside Coen’s house

Once you leave the house after the opening chores, Yanna is standing on the road just north of the Laslea Centre shrine with Lunka and Mirto. Mirto explains that Yanna will not take the path to the river alone because she is afraid of wolves. Speak to any of the three and the quest lands in your journal.

You can agree to go straight away or tell them you need to collect herbs for your mother first. Neither answer removes the quest. If you wander off for long enough, the siblings head to the river on their own, and you can still join them there. You only miss the walking conversation, not the reward.

Walk your siblings to the river and skip the tag game

Follow Yanna along the dirt path heading northeast out of the village. Lunka and Mirto trail behind and start grumbling about the walk roughly halfway there.

When Yanna hands the problem to you, pick “Stop complaining – right now.” The kids sulk, but the group keeps moving and the quest still only costs one time segment. The alternative, “Let’s play tag – best way to get them moving,” makes them happier and adds a chase minigame, but it burns a second time segment for no extra reward.

Dialogue wheel showing the option to tell Lunka and Mirto to stop complaining on the path — The dialogue choice that ends the complaining without spending an extra time segment. Image: Rebel Wolves

Keep walking with the group until the riverbank loads in. If the kids run ahead, you can catch up at the fishing spot; the scene waits for you there.

Coen follows his siblings down the forest path with a talk prompt on screen — Following the siblings down the wooded path toward the river during the escort objective. Image: Rebel Wolves

Tip: The clock in the Prologue is tight, so the tag detour is the one part of Live Bait worth skipping outright if you also plan to make Esme’s medicine before sundown.

Find the four fishing rods with Focus Mode

At the river, Yanna asks Coen to dig out the rods Pieter stashed nearby. They are invisible in the normal view, so the objective will not budge until you switch to Focus Mode, which desaturates the scene and paints interactive objects gold.

Platform	Focus Mode input
PC	Right-click
PlayStation 5	L2
Xbox Series X\|S	LT

Hold Focus Mode and turn toward the bushes just behind where Yanna is standing. The rods glow as a single highlighted cluster on the bank.

Coen at the riverbank with the siblings, about to search the bushes for the hidden rods — The riverbank arrival, right before switching to Focus Mode to spot the hidden fishing rods. Image: Rebel Wolves

Walk into the highlighted bush and hold the loot prompt until all four Fishing Rods are in your inventory. Grabbing three of them leaves the objective stuck, so sweep the whole marked patch before you move on.

Set up the rods and bait the hooks with worms

Look along the water’s edge for four small piles of rocks. Each one is a marked setup spot, and interacting with it plants a rod. There is no guesswork about placement or spacing.

With all four rods planted, walk up to any of them and use the Setup Bait prompt. This is the exact moment the quest spends its time segment, so finish any nearby herb gathering first if you are optimizing the day.

Sit through the cutscene. Coen demonstrates how to hook a worm while the four of them talk about their mother’s illness and the pressure on the family. Every dialogue option here is flavor only, so answer however you like.

The soldier confrontation and the Uriash

Brencis’s Officer interrupts the conversation and starts pressing Coen about where Pieter is. The questioning escalates until he turns his attention to Coen’s sister. From that point, some replies carry a sword icon, and picking one draws steel immediately.

Brencis's Officer questioning Coen at the riverbank while the siblings look on — Brencis’s Officer confronts Coen about his father at the fishing spot. Image: Rebel Wolves

Neutral answers such as “I don’t know” or “As far as I know, he’s back home” keep the exchange verbal and skip the duel entirely. If you would rather fight, the sword-icon options start a one-on-one sword duel that ends as soon as either side is badly hurt. It is not a kill fight, and losing it does not fail the quest.

Coen trading sword blows with the marked officer as the quest tracker updates — The optional duel against the officer, which ends once either fighter is badly injured. Image: Rebel Wolves

Either way, a Uriash — a horned Vrakhiri beast — steps out and sends the officer away. It tells Coen that Brencis has ordered Pieter’s death, says it has no appetite for carrying that out, and asks Coen to pass the warning along. Seeing Lunka upset, it also offers a gift meant to keep the family’s calf quiet. Accepting or refusing changes nothing later, and taking it calms Lunka down. Before leaving, the Uriash reminds the family to be at the Blood Mass at sundown.

Every Live Bait choice and what it changes

Choice	Effect
Help Yanna now or fetch herbs first	No difference; the quest stays available either way
Play tag with Lunka and Mirto	Costs 1 extra time segment, extra character dialogue
Tell them to stop complaining	Kids sulk, group keeps walking, no extra time cost
Dialogue during the baiting scene	Flavor only
Sword-icon reply to the officer	Triggers a duel; same cutscene follows
Calm replies to the officer	Skips the duel, no damage taken
Accept or refuse the Uriash’s gift	No lasting effect; accepting calms Lunka

How to confirm Live Bait is complete

The quest wraps as soon as the Uriash walks off with the soldier. You get the completion notification with 250 XP, and Live Bait drops out of your active objectives in the journal. Depending on how much else you have done in the Prologue, that XP can be enough to push Coen to the next level.

There are only two ways this stalls. The objective will not advance if you have not looted all four rods from the bush or planted every one of them at the rock piles, and the whole quest disappears permanently once the Sacred Covenant begins and the Prologue ends. If you want the XP and the early warning about Brencis, do it while the sun is still up.