Category:Secondary Quests

You will get better equipment if you do the side quests.

Chapter 2’s side quest
You need to get dolls from the little girl’s mother first (near Alter), then talk with the same little girl twice in the dungeon. After that, you need to go back to her mom and she will transform into an Octopus. You will get Warm Flesh by finishing it off, and Father’s Love by killing the boss. Do note that you won’t get Father’s Love if you kill the boss first.

Secondary Quest: Investigate the Four Holy Pillars
You first meet the humpback pope at the bottom of the elevator. You have to accept his request to investigate the 4 pillars (towers, really). That starts the quest. - Somewhere underground you have to find the room with several guys in cabinets where you get the keys for the tower doors.

-Then you have to find the way to all four towers, open them and collect the sword parts on the altars(?) inside. A hilt here, a broken blade there ...

-Once you have all 4 parts, return to Trinity Yard, to the statue that was presenting the Tristram sword. The sword-shaped groove in the statue will fuse the parts together to create the Blessed Basilisk sword/trophy.

-Return to the dying demiurge and choose to stab her with the Basilik. (Not sure if that's needed for the Pillars quest, but it finishes Die or become Sendril.) - Enter Trinity Hall; in the room with a central pillar and the locked door to Proxy's chamber on the far side the humpback pope (Eckhart) should be waiting. Chat with him to conclude the quest.

Deep into the Dark Mist
If you purchased the Deep into the Dark Mist DLC, you can go to the Carriage after Chapter 4 and purchase the lamp from the owl. You can then find the Dark Mist Campsite near the horse bell. (Not every horse bell has a campsite nearby.

The difficulty of DLC is independent and not related to the difficulty of your main game or what Chapter you in.) There are many new equipment and weapons in the Dark Mist and most of them are better than what you can get in main game. You cannot enhance or recast what you get in the Dark Mist. The higher the levels you passed in the DLC, the better the rewards you get from chests. My view is that you don’t need to choose the highest level the first time since you can get the same rewards in easy mode.

In short, finish the DLC first if you want better items. Do note that you cannot withdraw from the DLC in the middle of the game. You need to finish all the bosses or use the horse bell outside the boss chamber. If you want to challenge the boss again, try shutting down background processes and restart the game to avoid going back to the Dark Mist Campsite.