Note: This article contains spoilers for the Blood-Stained Shrine on Iki Island. If you’d rather solve its puzzles yourself, read no further.
Hidden on Iki Island in the Ghost of Tsushima expansion content are three strange shrines adorned by huge statues. On your “Collections” menu, these are referred to as Wind Shrines, and each contains a riddle you’ll need to solve. If you’re a fan of other PlayStation exclusives, you should recognize what they’re referencing–three era-defining PlayStation 4 games. Those games are Bloodborne, God of War, and Shadow of the Colossus, and unlocking their riddles earns you cosmetic armors that were previously only available in Ghost of Tsushima’s Legends mode.
The Blood-Stained Shrine is the place you’ll find an homage to Yarnham and the Hunters of Old. Here’s where to find it and how to unlock its secrets. Don’t forget to check out our guides to find the Shrine of Ash and get the God of War armor, and to find the Shrine in Shadow and get the Shadow of the Colossus armor.
Note that to complete this shrine, you need to complete The Six Blades of Kojiro, a Mythic Tale back on Tsushima.
Where To Find The Blood-Stained Shrine
Head to the west side of Iki island, to Gonoura Cape. You’ll find the shrine near the coast, before you hit the Viper’s Den. Look for it on top of a rolling green hill.
How To Solve The Blood-Stained Shrine Riddle
When you enter the shrine, you’ll notice a lot of elements recalling Bloodborne and its setting of Yarnham. Specifically, the shrine is a reference to Eileen the Crow, one of the NPC Hunters you can find in the game, and you’ll find black feathers and loud crows all over the area.
Venture to the base of the statue and you’ll find a scroll with a poem giving you a hint about what you need to do in the shrine:
The first green of spring
sickens to black, decaying,
plagued by blood and beast.
Hunter, reject death’s allure.
Prepare to duel man’s frailty.
The poem is full of references to what happens in Bloodborne–it’s about a town plagued by blood and beasts, after all. But it also tells you what you need to do in the shrine. Specifically, it refers to the reader as Hunter, and tells you to “reject death’s allure.”
First, to embody the Hunter, you’ll need to wear the Kensei armor, which you can earn from the Mythic Tale The Six Blades of Kojiro. Next, you’ll need to “reject death’s allure.” Put another way, you need to stop yourself from dying–otherwise known as healing yourself. Make sure you have some Resolve banked and inflict some injury on Jin by jumping off one of the high rocks that wall the shrine. Land in front of the statue and then heal yourself by pressing down on the D-Pad.
That’ll trigger a cutscene, and when you finish, you’ll earn two Bloodborne-themed items: the Yarnham Helm and the Yarnham Vestments, which is a cosmetic for the Kensei Armor made to look like Eileen the Crow.
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