THE FIELD GUIDE
Who Pulls the Strings: Silas’s Book and Life Lock
Silas’s Book is on the wooden pedestal in Svetlana’s third-floor room in Aurelius’s Tower. Defeat her, inspect the book to receive Life Lock, then return to Crake at the manumit hideout and finish the conversation about his preparations.
Finish What Moves the Dead before the hand-in
Who Pulls the Strings follows What Moves the Dead in Crake’s questline. The journal also calls him Marat. After the workshop investigation, he directs you to Aurelius’s Tower to recover the book.
Check your active objective before travelling. If you explored the tower earlier and already collected Silas’s Book, the quest can skip straight to “Show Marat the book”. Return to the hideout instead of making another tower trip.
If your journal still concerns the gargoyle inscription or Silas’s workshop, finish that preceding investigation first. The inscription entry below covers the daytime meeting with Crake and Mevasser, the woodcut and the concealed workshop entrance.
Update 1.1 adds a missing objective indicator for this quest. If a tracking marker is absent on an older version, update and use the journal text to identify your stage. That marker fix is separate from already owning the book and being sent straight to the hand-in.
CrakeEnter Aurelius’s Tower during the day or night
Aurelius’s Tower is Silts Tower, in the southwest of Vale Sangora. Use the Aurelius’s Tower shrine as your approach landmark. You can reach the book during either phase: the entrance uses ordinary stairs and does not require vampire traversal.
Choose the visit around abilities you already use. Daytime suits a Witchcraft loadout; nighttime lets you use your vampire abilities. There is no need to spend time waiting for night solely to climb this tower.
- Defeat the gargoyle guarding the approach. When it rises into the air, watch which arm leads the swoop: the incoming swipe follows that side and can be blocked. Counter after the attack rather than expecting a Sword Art to interrupt it.
- Climb the exterior steps and enter the door at the top of the first flight. The basement is an optional investigation detour; the book objective is upstairs.
- Follow the interior stairs, deal with the three soldiers on the second floor and continue to Svetlana’s room on the third.
Fight Svetlana on the third floor
Svetlana’s close-range attacks come quickly. If you cannot time her parries reliably, use Omniblock while keeping enough stamina to defend, then counter when the sequence ends. Avoid spending the whole bar on attacks while she is beside you.
When she teleports away, expect two raven flocks in succession. Sidestep each wave before closing the distance for a Sword Art or another available attack; moving in after only the first flock exposes you to the second.
For her short-range area attack, watch for the red skull warning and dodge backward out of reach. Use the recovery afterward to attack.
Search the body, then inspect the book’s pedestal
After the fight, search Svetlana’s body for the Vault Key and a Cycle of Ruin Manual. Then inspect the wooden pedestal in her room for Silas’s Book. The pedestal is the quest interaction; looting the body alone does not collect the book.
The story reward unlocks Life Lock and grants rank 1. Open Character to check your learned rank before planning later upgrades. Mevasser’s Life Lock Manual becomes available after this discovery, but you do not need to buy it to obtain a first rank already granted by the quest.
Silas’s Book
Cycle of Ruin ManualThe door above starts Home Sweet Home
For Crake’s book request, you can turn back from the third floor. Going one floor higher and using the door starts Home Sweet Home, an optional early-ending route. Keep a separate manual save before entering if you want to explore it and then resume your campaign.
The Vault Key concerns the library vault, so that lock is not the door that starts Home Sweet Home. Neither detour is required to take the pedestal book back to Crake.
Vault KeyShow Crake the book and ask about preparations
Return to the manumit hideout in Svartrau. Show Marat the book, then continue the conversation to ask how preparations are going. Finish both exchanges to close Who Pulls the Strings.
The preparation wait for Rise at Dawn belongs to the next stage of his plan. If that is now your objective, you have moved beyond the tower search. For Crake’s optional personal conversations, check the Distant Shadows and A Closer Look route before committing to an ending departure.