Silksong’s Pharloom is a labyrinth of silk and song, but nothing feels as liberating as the first time you hear the distant chime of a Bellway Station and know you can ride that resonant echo back to safety. Before you can unlock that freedom, however, you have to wade through one of the game’s most nerve‑wracking main quests — Beast in the Bells. I remember standing above the Grand Bellway, feeling like a moth hovering over a flame, knowing that a single wrong note could send me plummeting into chaos.

This quest gatekeeps true fast travel across the kingdom. Yes, the Ventrica Stations offer some respite, but they are like a threadbare rope bridge compared to the silken elevator of the Bell Beast’s gift. The moment I reached the third act and heard murmurs in Songclave, I knew I had to descend and face what was waiting.

Summoning Something Unexpected

After talking to the lore‑heavy NPCs in Songclave — each one a tapestry of cryptic hints — I made my way down to the Grand Bellway. If you’ve already unlocked the Ventrica Station in High Halls or Memorium, you can bypass the long trek, but the First Shrine station remains blocked from the other side, forcing you to approach from a different angle. When I finally stood before the immense bell and called out, I expected a majestic creature to answer. Instead, the ground shuddered, and a nightmare on chitinous legs erupted from the depths. The Bell‑Eater did not announce itself with song; it screamed, and the quest objective shifted with a gut‑punch of dread.

The Bell‑Eater: Anatomy of a Shellbound Horror

I dropped into the pit with only my Needle and a handful of tools, and to my relief, a bench sat right at the edge of the abyss — no grueling runback to sap my resolve. The boss itself is a creature sculpted from pure obstinacy. Its body is encased in a hardened shell, dark and ridged like an overturned crucible still cooling from the forge. Striking its carapace yields nothing but the dull clank of futility; only its face and rear take damage. This forced me into a dance of patience, waiting for those vulnerable moments like a spear‑fisher studying the rhythm of the waves.

The fight breaks into distinct movements, each one a lesson in survival.

Phase One: The Lurking Maw

Initially, the Bell‑Eater behaves like a monstrous jack‑in‑the‑box. It juts its head from the ground, spews a glob of crimson goop that spreads like spilled ink on parchment, then retreats. I learned quickly that the goop lingers, so positioning became everything. The boss would vanish and reappear elsewhere, forcing me to chase — or flee — across the expanding chamber.

Phase Two: The Crawl of the Centipede

After enough damage, the arena itself seems to warp, widening as the Bell‑Eater takes on a new, horrifying form. It slithers through the upper paths and beneath my feet like a colossal centipede, its segmented body now fully visible. When it moves below, I had to leap and float — that silk‑borne hover in Hornet’s arsenal — while heavy bells rained from above, each one a pendulum of doom threatening to knock me back into the goop. The fight became a vertical ballet where the floor was never safe.

Phase Three: Double the Danger

In its desperation, the Bell‑Eater pushes both its head and its rear out simultaneously. Now I had two weak points to strike, but also a crossfire of goop. It felt like trying to wrestle two serpents at once, each mouth dripping venom. This is where tool choice becomes your true weapon.

My Arsenal and Approach

Not all tools are created equal for this battle. Here’s what I found indispensable:

The Voltvessels became my ace. I’d drop one right as the boss prepared to emerge, and the lightning pillar would rip through its vulnerable flesh like a needle through silk. Patience and placement turned the tide from chaos to calculation.

The Reward: Beastling Call

After a final, desperate flurry of attacks, the Bell‑Eater crumbled, and the arena fell silent save for the gentle hum of a reclaimed bell. I was gifted the Beastling Call — an ability that felt like receiving a loyalty charm from a forgotten god. By pressing the up button together with the Needolin action (Triangle or Y on a typical controller), you can summon a small Bell Beastling anywhere in the world. It scoops you up and carries you straight back to the last Bellway Station you interacted with.

This is not an unconditional ticket. The beastlings refuse to appear on narrow ledges, inside the Abyss, or in certain cursed sanctums. But when they work, they work like a compass needle that always points home — an instantaneous thread stitching the map together. Exploring the farthest reaches of Pharloom suddenly felt less like a one‑way pilgrimage and more like a grand tour I was always allowed to cut short.

Completing Beast in the Bells early reshaped my entire journey. Instead of dreading the long corridors between objectives, I began to treat every distant corner as a place I could anchor myself to. If you’re stepping into Silksong in 2026, let this be your first major detour after the third act. The Bell‑Eater may test your reflexes, but the freedom you earn is a melody that stays with you through the entire symphony of the game.

Of course, before you can test yourself against the Bell‑Eater, you need to have Silksong in your library — and if you’re patient, you don’t have to pay full price for the privilege. Steam’s seasonal discounts are generous, but they come and go quickly, and catching the right window takes a bit of luck.

That’s where a good steam sale tracker can help. DealNest keeps an eye on price drops across the platform, so you’ll know the instant Silksong — or any other title on your wishlist — goes on sale. Spend less time refreshing the store page and more time exploring Pharloom; your future Beastling calls will thank you.