Taking the familiar Soulsborne formula of challenging combat and towering bosses, From Software has somehow made Elden Ring more approachable for players. While the difficulty remains, especially for those who are looking for a challenge, the massive open world of Elden Ring presents many opportunities for exploration. Instead of following the golden path, players can instead opt to go in a different direction, find better loot, and even level up a bit before taking on an imposing boss.
In Elden Ring, exploration is typically rewarded with loot, a mob of characters to take down, or perhaps one of the many dungeons littered across the Lands Between. Players have continued to discover all sorts of gear through exploring all of the nooks and crannies, even developing unique builds or just having a little fun by combining things like the twinblade with the Bloodflame Blade ability to resemble the Star Wars villain, Darth Maul.
For those who want a build that causes bleed damage, the Rivers of Blood katana is a great option even for non-Samurai players. However, Elden Ring players will need to venture into a late game area in order to track it down. Here's everything players need to know about the Rivers of Blood katana and where to find it.
Where to Find Rivers of Blood Katana
In order to get the Rivers of Blood Katana, Elden Ring players will need to head to the Mountaintops of the Giants zone to the Northeastern section of the map. In order to access this area, players will need to have progressed the main quest far enough, so it's not likely that newer or underleveled players will be able to skip through and grab this early.
Once inside Mountaintops of the Giants, players will need to find the Church of Repose in the Southeast section, where an NPC invader named Bloody Finger Okina will spawn in on approach. Wielding the Rivers of Blood Katana and a shorter sword, Okina will likely be a challenging fight as he's fast, aggressive, and can inflict blood loss status effects very quickly. However, Okina will stop to heal, which gives players a window of opportunity to punish him. Stay aggressive and Okina will fall.
Thankfully, Okina will reward players with over 700 runes, the Okina Mask, and the real prize, the Rivers of Blood katana.
What Rivers of Blood Katana Does
As expected, Rivers of Blood katana is a weapon that causes blood loss buildup in enemies. However, in order to use it, players will need to have 12 Strength, 18 Dexterity, and 20 Arcane. The weapon itself scales with those three stats and is a good choice for mid-range combat thanks to its long reach. It's a weapon that is also capable of inflicting both slash and piercing damage.
Its unique weapon kill is called Corpse Piler, which forms a blade of cursed blood that unleashes a flurry of attacks which players can follow up on. It's worth noting that the Rivers of Blood katana can't be enchanted with Magic or boosted by consumables. In order to upgrade the blade, players will need to locate and use Somber Smithing Stones.
Elden Ring is available for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.