Five puzzles, and four of them pay a sword heart
The wiki lists exactly five named puzzles. What matters for planning is that the rewards are not cosmetic — four of the five hand over a Mea Culpa Heart, and four of the eleven total hearts (9 original + 2 DLC) come from these puzzles.
| Puzzle | Location | Reward |
|---|---|---|
| Anatomy Books Puzzle | Library of the Negated Words | Romance to the Crimson Mist (heart) |
| Banging Sound Puzzle | Library of the Negated Words | The Young Masons Wheel (heart) |
| Bloodstain Gate Puzzle | Graveyard of the Peaks | Heart of the Unnamed Minstrel (heart) |
| Candle Puzzle | The Sleeping Canvases | Molten Heart of Boiling Blood (heart) |
| Elevator Puzzle | Wall of the Holy Prohibitions | Quirce’s Scorched Bead (rosary bead) |
Two puzzles sit in the same zone. Library of the Negated Words holds both the Anatomy Books and the Banging Sound puzzle, so one clean sweep of that area is worth two hearts — and that library is also the zone the Amber Eye bead sits in, behind a poison fog corridor.
The Elevator Puzzle is the odd one out: its reward is a bead, not a heart. If you are chasing the heart achievement, that puzzle is optional, and skipping it costs you nothing on the heart count.
All 7 relics with their zones
Relics are the game’s traversal and information equipment. There are 7, you can wear 3, and none of them are required to finish the base game.
| Relic | Effect | Zone |
|---|---|---|
| Blood Perpetuated in Sand | Walk on blood platforms | Brotherhood of the Silent Sorrow |
| Incorrupt Hand of the Fraternal Master | Chime in rooms with a secret passage | Albero |
| Linen of Golden Thread | Drop into pits | The Sleeping Canvases |
| Nail Uprooted from Dirt | Move normally in mud | Mother of Mothers |
| Shroud of Dreamt Sins | Hear dialogue from corpses | Albero |
| Silvered Lung of Dolphos | Pass through poison fog safely | Grievance Ascends |
| Three Gnarled Tongues | Climbable roots grow when you approach | Albero |
Three of the seven come from Albero, which is why players who never return to the starting town end up short. The wiki lists three acquisition routes in total: a hard-to-reach room with a reliquary, an NPC gift, or blessing a specific quest item at the Blessed Lord of Salty Shores.
One piece of trivia that is actually a design clue: 5 of the 7 relics are human body parts or organs, mirroring real-world saint relics. The two that are not — the Linen and the Hand — are the two that change how you find things rather than how you move.
The two secret-passage tools
“Blasphemous hidden items” and “how to find secrets” are the same question, and the game gives you two instruments for it.
Incorrupt Hand of the Fraternal Master plays a chime when you enter a room containing a secret passage. It does not mark the wall — it tells you the room is worth searching. Equipping it turns wandering into a checklist: clear the room, listen, then look at floors, ceilings and dead ends.
Weight of Sin (500 Tears, level 1) is the plunge attack, and its second function is breakage. Holding down and attack in the air drops you straight down, and the wiki notes plainly that this “can uncover some secret passages”. Floors that look solid are the usual hiding place.
Add the Shroud of Dreamt Sins and corpses start talking. Those lines are not flavour: they are how several quests tell you where to go next, and the 26-corpse achievement depends on listening to all of them.
Six collection lists, not one
“100%” in Blasphemous means six overlapping counters. Knowing which list you are short on stops you re-clearing finished areas.
| List | Count | Achievement |
|---|---|---|
| Collectibles (original set) | 44 | Warden of the Ossuary |
| Rosary beads | 30 | Mysteria Lucis |
| Prayers (original) | 13 | Unwavering Devotion (4 more from DLC = 17 total) |
| Mea Culpa Hearts (original) | 9 | Heartbreaker (2 more from DLC = 11 total) |
| Relics | 7 | Skin and Bones |
| Corpse dialogues | 26 | Last Words |
Two more completion counters sit outside the item lists: Bestiary wants 51 original enemy types defeated, and The Number of the Beasts wants 666 kills total. Those two are pure playtime, not exploration, which is why a player at 100% map can still be missing both.
The puzzles nobody explains
Two of the five are the ones that generate the most forum threads, and both are in the library.
The Anatomy Books Puzzle wants books placed in a specific arrangement — the reward is the heart, and the arrangement is readable from the room itself rather than from an external hint. The Banging Sound Puzzle is triggered by striking something in the room in response to a sound cue; the name is the mechanic.
The Bloodstain Gate Puzzle in Graveyard of the Peaks reads bloodstains as a pattern, and the Candle Puzzle in The Sleeping Canvases is a lighting-order puzzle. The Elevator Puzzle in Wall of the Holy Prohibitions is a floor-selection sequence.
What all five share: they are contained in one room, they may require a specific item equipped or in inventory, and the reward is always behind a single correct action rather than a fetch chain. If a puzzle is not resolving, the usual cause is a missing relic — Silvered Lung of Dolphos and Blood Perpetuated in Sand gate access to two of these rooms.
A search order that respects the gating
- Albero first. Three relics are handed out there. Leaving town without them is the most common early miss.
- Library of the Negated Words, twice. Two puzzles, one bead, one fog corridor. Bring Silvered Lung of Dolphos or you cannot reach the Amber Eye side.
- Graveyard of the Peaks for the Bloodstain Gate heart, The Sleeping Canvases for the Candle heart.
- Wall of the Holy Prohibitions last among the puzzles — it pays a bead, not a heart.
- Keep Incorrupt Hand equipped on any sweep where you are not fighting for your life. The chime is worth more than one bead slot in an area you have not cleared.
Related guides
- Blasphemous Jump and Platforming Guide — which relic opens which surface
- Blasphemous Relics Guide — the 3-slot cap and how to build around it
- Blasphemous Mea Culpa Hearts Guide — all 11 hearts (9 original + 2 DLC), including the 4 from these puzzles
- Blasphemous Achievements Guide — all 45 achievements with real thresholds
- Blasphemous Map Guide — zone order and where each area connects
- Blasphemous Hub — all guides for this game