FromSoftware games are known for their unique and often horrific boss designs. In fact, the phrase “Dark Souls boss” has now become internet shorthand for describing any sort of terrifying or twisted monster design. FromSoftware’s latest game, Elden Ring, contains the most bosses of any game in the developer’s series of dark fantasy RPGs, and it is no exception when it comes to horrific monster designs.
Elden Ring players will face a wide variety of monsters, even without exploring the game's optional areas. But Elden Ring’s map is so full of hidden secrets that even the most inquisitive players may never come across some of the game’s most twisted optional bosses.
The Death Rite Bird is a recurring optional boss in Elden Ring that can be found in four different areas of the game’s map and is a more powerful version of Elden Ring’s equally mysterious Deathbird enemy. Very little information is known about this enemy, but an interesting design detail pointed out by a Reddit user named Double_Mashed_Potato has put some of what is known about the creature into context.
The Reddit user has pointed out that the ghostflame wings of the Death Rite Bird contain ghostly figures holding spears. The Reddit user refers to these figures as soldiers, but through the item description of the Death Ritual Spear, which is received after defeating the Death Rite Bird in Elden Ring's Mountaintops of the Giants area, it is revealed that these figures are actually priests who swore an oath to protect the Death Birds. What is even more disturbing is that these same figures can also be seen jutting out of the open chest of the Death Rite Birds, which would imply that these priests were willfully consumed by the creature in order to form its wings.
From the few items dropped after killing the various Death Rite Birds, it is revealed that these monsters were once responsible for maintaining graveyard fires in the time before the Erdtree. Elden Ring’s Erdtree was created by an Outer God known as The Greater Will, which also brought with it the Elden Ring from the game's title, and introduced the concept of both permanent death and rebirth. It would stand to reason then, that in a time before The Greater Will, the residents of the Lands Between would have had different methods of dealing with death; specifically, they burned dead bodies in continuous ghostflame fires, which the Death Rite Birds were once responsible for.
The Reddit user discovered this detail from a video on a YouTube channel named BonfireVN, which takes an up-close free-cam look at the Death Rite Birds. Taking a closer look at the Death Rite Birds reveals many terrifying details which rival any of Elden Ring’s many other disturbing monster designs.
Elden Ring is available for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
