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Drangleic Castle Walkthrough

Access

The Castle is reached after defeating and acquiring the souls the four Bosses: The Old Iron King in Iron Keep, The Rotten in Black Gulch, The Lost Sinner in Sinners' Rise, and Duke's Dear Freja in Brightstone Cove Tseldora. Alternatively, the door can be opened by acquiring sufficient Soul Memory, that vary according to your NG status - click here for more details. 

From the Ruined Fork Road Bonfire in the Shaded Woods, head up the stairs to find three doorways. Out the left doorway, you'll find a path riddled with Falconers that lead down a slope until you reach a Forest Grotesque, a Ghost, a door arch blocked by rubble. Look left for a stone path, and you will enter the Shrine of Winter. If you have all four souls or sufficient Soul Memory, the Black Gate will open you can proceed through the other doorway, and down the path to take you to the Castle.

On your way, when you come down the zigzag slope, head right to pick up a Soul of a Hero, then continue left. You will shortly come across a Divine Blessing, and a couple of Ghosts. Continue down the path to find a corpse on a small wall on the right, containing a Large Soul of a Nameless Soldier, and a Human Effigy. Shortly after, you'll find the entrance to a tunnel that leads a set of stairs. Eventually, you'll reach the outdoors. Proceed forward and you will reach a long spiral staircase, atop of which you will find three Royal Swordsmen on your left. Proceed up the next set of stairs, making sure to check a boulder on the right for 2x Holy Water Urn. Walk a little further to be prompted with the title, signifying your entry to the Castle.

Exterior Staircase

Note: While you are in the outside area of the Castle, the rain will drench you and any enemy in water, reducing everyone's lightning resistance and increases everyone's fire resistance.

Immediately after seeing the 'Drangleic Castle' title prompt, you'll find a Crystal Lizard on the stairs. At the first archway, the Emerald Herald from Majula will be there to allow you to exhaust her limited dialogue. If you continue up the stairs, you'll come across two Primal Knight statues; they will attack when you get too close, so get the jump on them, before they do on you.

Once you make it to the castle doors, you will be attacked by a total of five Royal Swordsmen. If you stray to the right, one of the Syan Soldier statues will come to life and join in the attack; if you stray to the left, two of the three here will also reanimate. This can get tricky to deal with since you also have to feed a soul to each of the Golems by the doors to actually open them (defeat an enemy near each of the Golems, you will not receive souls from enemies killed but can see them fly to activate the golems), however the big open space can play well into your hands. Once they've been dealt with, search the right side of the building to find a chest containing a Fire Seed and Great Combustion, then into the doors to enter the castle.

Interior Castle

Once inside talk to the invisible NPC, Chancellor Wellager, on the staircase. After exhausting his dialogue options and learning about the King and Queen, he will become a merchant.

After speaking with him, head down the left stairwell (facing the entrance). Once you enter the hallway on your left, a Syan Soldier guarding a door, containing a chest with a Sublime Bone Dust. Continue down the hallway, baiting the Syan Soldier statues to come alive, and killing any that do; including the one you killed first, there should be four statues that come to life in this particular hallway. Open the door at the end, and before you head down the ladder, one of the two "statues" is actually a Royal Swordsman. Down the ladder will be two sets of pale blue doors. Open both to find the King's Gate bonfire.

Golem Door Hall

From the bonfire there will be two paths, left and right. Since you need a Key item to go left, you should go right instead. You will enter a room with several Stone Soldiers. Some in pairs in front of Golem doors that you have to feed a soul to in order to open, just like how you entered the castle. All the Golem doors in this room house a Ruin Sentinel. At the back of the room are two Golems that will light torches if you feed them a soul. Once the Golems are fed souls, they need not be fed again.

Once you kill a foe near one of the Golem doors it will open, but don't get excited. Behind each door except the first one on the right as you enter, a Ruin Sentinel guards an item or chest:

• Left side:
  1. Nothing to collect from the first room.
  2. 1x Pharros' Lockstone in the middle room.
  3. The last room on this side hides a hole leading to a darkdweller guarding the Faraam Set. If you take the tunnel on the left from down here, you may find Darkdiver Grandahl. If this is the third time see him, you will be able to enter his Covenant 'the Pilgrims of the Dark'. Make your way to the other tunnel to the Under Castle Drangleic bonfire. 
• Right side: 
  1. For progress, enter the first room.
  2. Claim a Mastodon Greatsword from the middle room.
  3. The Royal Soldier's Ring +1 can be obtained from the last room on this side.

 

The First Door on the Right

Once you pass through the Golem door, head to the chest with 15x Dark Arrows in front of you. Turning right and going up the stairs, you will find a corpse with the Frozen Flower. Of the 3 statues in front of you, the right one will come alive as an Royal Swordsman. Turn left and grab the 3x Old Radiant Lifegem, a Monastery Charm, and a Soul of a Hero from the skeleton beneath the stairwell. Going up the stairs (don't mind the intimidating statues, none of them will come alive), you will eventually come to an outside area (indicated by the returning raining) with corrosive acid covering the floors and contraptions shaped like dragons (which get activated when they are hit by anything) spitting even more acid at you. As you enter the area, you will hear statues coming to life. Carefully looking up on the right, you will see the now alive Royal Swordsman, ready to shoot lightning infused bolts at intruders.
The acid pools will not deal any damage to you, but will greatly damage all of your equipment, so, after having taken care of the Swordsman, follow proper bathing etiquette and remove your equipped items. While taking a nice relaxing acid bath, gather the Elizabeth Mushroom near the stairs, and the 3x Corrosive Urn from a chest at the far end. After your bath, remember to reequip your items, then move upstairs. The second-from-right Royal Swordsman will come alive to chase you, if you want to fight a bit more, you can also attack the one on the far right right and the one on the second-from-left to force them to come alive.

After taking care of everything in here, go to the right to a small outside passage. Ascend the stairs to come across a door to a room filled with masks. A chest in this room holds a Large Soul of a Brave Warrior and a Twinkling Titanite. After opening the chest, the masks all shoot arrows at you from all directions, so stand still and let the first shot shoot, then dash for the door. The arrows will buildup poison quickly, so be sure to have something to cure it in case you get hit too many times. Exiting the room will bring you to a small staircase above the acid pool. Ascend the stairs into the next room, which has three Syan Soldiers statues that all come to life if you get too close to them. There is also a big painting of Nashandra in this room, be careful to not go too close to it, as it will quickly build up curse After dealing with the Syan Soldiers pick up the loot that they were guarding which is in total, 10x Fire Greatarrow and 10x Destructive Greatarrow, 3x Torch, and a Petrified Dragon Bone. 

Dragonriding Duo Duel

Exiting this area via the door, you will get invaded by Nameless Usurper. After dealing with her, going up some stairs will lead you outside (back into the rain) to some more stairs. You'll encounter two Royal Swordsmen in the right, upper area, shooting lightning-infused bolts at you. When you enter the are the Swordsmen were, the Syan Soldier behind you will come to live. After dealing with them, look for a ladder here and climb it down. There will be another Royal Swordsmen coming to live her, guarding a corpse with a Soul of a Brave Warrior. Examine the middle wall here; press the "use" button on your controller to reveal an illusory wall that opens to the Forgotten Chamber bonfire. This is a good time to rest because of the upcoming boss fight. Another ladder directly in front of the bonfire wall take you down to a chest containing Hunter's Blackbow and 20x Iron Arrows, and another  Royal Soldier. After opening the chest, climb back up the ladder and continue along the path you enter a room with the Queen seated at the far end. Talk to her, exit through the side, and get ready for a boss battle. If you need help for the Boss, a summon sign for Pilgrim Bellclaire can be found on the right of the fog gate.

BOSS FIGHT: Twin Dragonriders

Elevator Mechanic

After this fight, move right to the next area, where we meet our friend Benhart of Jugo again, siting near the Central Drangleic Castle bonfire. The stairs up to the right only lead to a dead end (for now) as well as an Alonne Knight, shooting Great arrows from above, so head down the stairs on the left instead. After a short walk, you come into a room small room, with an elevator, which is currently unavailable to use. The door in front of you is locked as well, so head up the ladder on the right instead. Up the ladder and through a door we drop down into another room with a Golem, that needs to be activated with souls. Continue to the Golem Door Hall, none of these statues will come alive, instead, we have to get to the next room to find a worthy sacrifice. Before we enter the next room though, trigger the Wall Spectre on the right of the door and take care of him before he gets a problem, then enter the next room. Carefully proceed further into the room, to trigger two old "friends" to appear, the Masked Manikin. Lure at least one of them back to the Golem, to make their souls activate him, who in turn activates the elevator from earlier. After taking care of that, head back into the room, where you can loot the two iron chests: one contains the Old Knight Hammer, and the other one Caitha's Chime and the Soul Greatsword. This room also has a summon sign for Sellsword Luet. The next room has is a big staircase, and an Executioner's Chariot that drops Gower's Ring of Protection.

At the top of the staircase, an Old Knight with a hammer will attack you. There's an Old Knight guarding a chest on each side at the top as well. The chest on the right contains the Pyromancy spell, Fire Storm. While the chest on the left isn't actually a chest, it's a mimic chest containing a Petrified Dragon Bone and a Washing Pole. Head back down the stairs and out the doors to find yourself back outside. On the right, you will see a blue door, and right next to it, a path going down. The door doesn't open, but there is a ladder next to it which you can use to climb, and kill the Gargoyle and Alonne Archer.

Head back down the ladder and go through the small brown door at the bottom of the stair, to two Desert Sorceress, another Wall Spectre and a corpse with 5x Repair Power, and 10x Flame Butterfly. The chest near the ballista also holds an Estus Flask Shard. Now pull the lever near the gate and it will open. Open the door and make your way down the stairs to the previous Central Drangleic Castle bonfire.

Passage to the King's Passage

From here head to the elevator and take it upwards, and through the door, entering a room with a caged cell containing an unlucky woman in it and an even more unlucky hollow, chained and bound to it upside down. His side-story can be found here: The Embedded.

There are three chests in here - one has the Key to King's Passage, another contains a Fire Seed and Soul Vessel, and the last one holds the Strong Magic Shield. Last but not least there's a hidden Hollow on the bars opposite of The Embedded. Just attack the bars and he'll drop a Small Smooth & Silky Stone.

Take the elevator back down and use the Key to King's Passage to open the previously looked big doors to King's Passage.

Farming (Souls & Titanite)

The Ruin Sentinels and the Stone Soldiers respawn, making the Golem Door Hall a constant danger, if you open all of the Golem doors to get the items. While a danger, this also presents an opportunity to farm since the Stone Soldiers spawn infinitely and Stone Soldiers have a rare chance of dropping Titanite Slabs,.

A good way of dealing with the Ruin Sentinels is to take them back to where the bonfire is, and keep them in that corridor. They won't attack you, but they will keep their shield up. It's slow to kill them, but it's much safer. You just have to stand in front of them while they try to walk back to the big open area. You can pull them towards that corridor so they start walking back, then moving towards them to make them attack. All of these attacks are guardable with a 100% physical resistance shield, and easily evaded by rolling. After they've attacked, you've got time to get one or two attacks or spells in while they don't have their shields up. As soon as their attack animation is complete, they'll raise their shield and ease out of the corridor, allowing you to rinse and repeat until they're finished. Try using poison arrows, 5-6 hits on a Sentinel are required to trigger the poison effect. You can also use Poison Mist and Toxic Mist through walls to poison them. They give some decent souls and can also drop their armor, so this area is pretty much ideal for farming, but only in NG, as they don't respawn in more advanced playthroughs. [On my third playthrough I found that they respawn just as before, please confirm/edit]