Forefathers' Eve Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Quest
Suggested level: 7
Group: Secondary Quests
Location: Velen
You will receive this quest when the pellar contacts you after you complete A Towerful of Mice quest. This can happen when you leave Keira's hut or when you visit the upper castle in Crow's Perch. Pellar will ask you to help protect him and a group of the villagers during the Forefathers' Eve ritual on Fyke Isle.
During his travels through No Man's Land Geralt ran into the pellar once more. The strange fellow had a favor to ask of the witcher. He wanted Geralt to help him perform a cherished local peasant rite known as Forefathers' Eve. During this ritual, he explained, lost spirits are summoned and their deeds judged - fantastic material, by the way, for a poet looking to make his name with an atmospheric ballad. This Forefathers' Eve was set to be held at midnight on Fyke Isle, and Geralt, having no other plans and his curiosity piqued, promised to attend.
Related points of interest
Stone Circle
Velen / Novigrad
Old Ambros Body
Velen / Novigrad
Quest stages of Forefathers' Eve
1. Meet the pellar in the stone circle on Fyke Isle at midnight. / Talk to the pellar and prepare for Forefathers' Eve.
Go to the Stone Circle on Fyke Island, wait until the nightfall and then talk to the pellar and tell him that he can start the ritual.
2. Protect the ritual's participants.
A while after the ritual began a few drowners, drowned dead, and a water hag will come from the lake. Kill them all. When you do that, the pellar will summon a spirit who apparently knows him very well. The ritual will be suddenly interrupted by the arrival of three witch hunters. You'll have to choose whether to oppose witch hunters ("Leave them alone") or let them interrupt the ritual ("Not my fight").
On Fyke Isle the pellar led the witcher through the arcane rites that marked the opening of Forefathers' Eve. Alas and alack, uninvited guests then arrived and threatened to break up the ritual before its conclusion. The witch hunters considered what the peasants practiced on Fyke Isle to be vile necromancy, and demanded they stop it at once.
If you let them stop the ritual, the quest will end here and the pellar will blame you for not helping him.
Witchers do their best to remain neutral, and so Geralt felt he should not get involved in what was, in the end, a dispute between humans. He thus did not lift a finger as the witch hunters scattered the peasants and brought the ritual to a premature conclusion.
As you can imagine, the pellar was not pleased by Geralt's indifference in the face of the witch hunters' persecution. Many a bitter word was uttered and then each went his own way.
3. Defeat the witch hunters. / Defeat the wraiths.
If you decide to defend pellar, then you' ll have to kill all witch hunters.
Abandoning his rule of not taking sides in others' affairs, the witcher chose to defend the ritual's participants. Predictably, this did not please the witch hunters one bit. A bloody fight broke out on Fyke Isle, and though it ended in victory for Geralt, it had a disastrous effect on the rest of the ritual.
The spilling the human blood during the ritual will cause three wraiths to appear which you will also have to kill.
After the fight, the pellar will reveal to you who was the spirit that appeared during the ritual. It was his own father, whom he killed and who is now harassing him. Geralt will inform the pellar that the only way to get rid of the ghost is to find his father's body and burn it. Then the pellar will tell you that his father's corpse is lying in the swamps.
4. Find the body of the pellar's father in the swamps using your Witcher Senses. / Burn the pellar's father's body.
Go to the swamps and find the Old Ambros Body. Examine it and then burn it using the Igni sign.
5. Talk to the pellar.
Go back to pellar's cabin and tell him you took care of the body. This will complete this quest, you will receive 50 crowns and unlock the pellar as a merchant who will sell you herbs and alchemical items.
Geralt had defended the peasants from the witch hunters' persecution, but spilled much blood in order to do so, sullying the sacred ground. Forefathers' Eve could not continue, but the pellar had one more request for Geralt. He wanted him to find and burn the body of Old Ambros. This man was the pellar's father, a cruel brute who returned from the dead to continue tormenting his son. Burning the body was a way to resolve the pellar's issues with his father and send the ghost of Old Ambros into the nether realms for good.