Elden Ring hosts a world defined by treachery, tragedy, deception, malice, and greed. Yet, there is one character that takes the cake for being the biggest rat in all of the Lands Between. Thus, the title of Elden Ring’s biggest rat is: White Mask Varre.
On my first playthrough of Elden Ring, the only interaction I had with our deceptively good-natured guide is meeting him by the First Step grace marker. Like most people who played Elden Ring as their first foray into the Dark Souls universe, I was totally lost. Without the reliable and abundant quest markers of similar open-world games, such as the Elder Scrolls, Witcher, Fallout, Red Dead, GTA, etc., I believed every person I met at face value and followed every bit of direction they gave me.
So, when White Mask Varre sent me to attack Stormveil Castle, I did. And, let me tell you, I can’t begin to describe what a mistake that was. I must have died 40-50 times before I could even find the castle’s entrance, then it was another 20-30 deaths trying to sneak my way around to Godrik the Grafted. And then I ran into Margit the Fell Omen. Mind you, this was all occurring when I was at level 11. Yeah, you can probably guess what happened then.
Needless to say, I quickly forgot about Varre and his blood-stained (which I didn’t even realize) white mask for the rest of that playthrough. On my second run, however, I decided to look up quests and items that I had missed on my first go around (which there was a lot of things I missed) and find them. And, to my surprise, I saw that there was a quest for our friendly guide who led me to Stormveil castle 10 levels too early.
(Bandai Namco/FromSoftware-Elden Ring-White Mask Varre)
“Great,” I said when I say the quest. “I can finally learn more about this Varre guy. Maybe we can even become friends.” Oh, how naïve I was back then.
As many people probably already figured out by their second playthrough, Varre is the furthest thing from a friendly guy. He is a full-blown worshiper of Mohg, the Lord of Blood, and was actively hunting my fellow Tarnished kin and using them as sacrifices. I didn’t realize any of this until he started giving me those bloody fingers and sent me on missions to kill other Tarnished. Then, he got me to join his cult/ lambkin (unknowingly on my behalf) by giving me some cloth to soak in a Maiden’s Blood.
“Okay,” I thought when he told me all of this. “There’s something really off with this story.” But, like the good open-world quest completionist that I am, I continued back to the First Step grace marker to get the blood from our Maiden who died. As I was trying to get the blood by spamming the A button on my Xbox controller (which I didn’t have to do as that Maiden’s blood didn’t even count), I accidently pressed on the blood stain right in front of my dead Maiden.
And what do you know, I see someone that looks a lot like Varre performing some sort of blood ritual in the same exact spot my Maiden died. As I started to think about what I just saw, I also began to wonder how strange it was that Varre knew that I was going to emerge in the Lands Between at that very spot. The more I thought about it, the more it felt as though he was waiting for me.
Then I put two and two together. White Mask Varre killed my Maiden, leaving me without a guide, and waited for me to enter the Lands Between. Thus, I would naturally trust and abide by his directions and friendly manner, which he would use to easily manipulate me onto the path of facing Godrick the Grafted. If I killed the demi-god, great. I would be a useful introduction to his lord’s cult. If I was slain by the Grafted, well, I guess he would just repeat the process with the next Tarnished.
(Bandai Namco/FromSoftware-Elden Ring-White Mask Varre)
I’m also assuming he would have taken my Great Rune (that we got from Godrick) and gave it to Mohg for some nefarious purpose. Once I figured this stuff out, I immediately went online and looked to see if anyone else came to this conclusion. And, to my great delight, there was Reddit discussions and threads about Varre and his nefarious actions.
In conclusion, I am officially deeming White Mask Varre as the biggest rat in all of the Lands Between. Not only did this guy kill our Maiden and lead us onto the path of his sadistic cult (if you followed his directions), but he also was the first person to roast us for being “Maidenless” when he is the reason why we are. What a loser!
Anyway, you may be able to tell that I was super excited that we got the opportunity to invade his world and put an end to his lambkin parade.
Images Source: Featured Image: (Bandai Namco/FromSoftware) (Elden Ring)
In Text Image 1: (Bandai Namco/FromSoftware) (Elden Ring)
In Text Image 2: (Bandai Namco/FromSoftware) (Elden Ring)
