One of the most magical cults that one could find in Arcane Lineage is the Cult of Thanasius.

Hidden away in the shadows of the Deep Forest, this mysterious covenant offers tremendous power to those willing to embrace its dark teachings.

Although most are inclined to choose the benevolent Church of Raphion, the Cult of Thanasius offers unique features and rewards that would entice that long road of dedication.

Find The Cult’s Hidden Sanctuary To Join Cult Of Thanasius In Arcane Lineage

The journey to join the Cult begins at the Deep Forest entrance near Caldera. The entire location is intentionally unknown. It includes many varied, puzzling caverns.

From the point at which you enter the Deep Forest, you will have to take a right turn and then watch out for an almost invisible cave opening on the left side.

You must enter the dark cave and just move forward without falling (which may either instantly kill you or cause considerable damage).

Eventually, you will see a mysterious mirror that acts as the gatekeeper for this cult. Interacting with this mirror requires selecting specific dialogue options—the third option followed by the first—which grants you the “Prey” passive ability.

Using this ability discloses a phrase that you must utter aloud; a battle will ensue with a Shia Elementalist (250 HP).

On defeating this guardian, the mirror shall allow entrance into the inner sanctum, where you can officially join the Cult of Thanasius.

Level Up Your Rank In Cult Of Thanasius

Rank progression in the Cult adopts Soul Absorb given at Rank 1. This ability does minimal damage but executes enemies below 5% health while healing you for 10% of your maximum HP.

Each successful execution advances the covenant, but most players find this less motivating than using blessing-based progression in the Church of Raphion.

As you ascend through the ranks, you unlock increasingly powerful abilities:

• Rank 5: Internal Corruption – +2 energy when killing a monster; +1 energy if summon kills it.
• Rank 10: Death Curtain – A powerful 2-energy skill that rains projectiles down upon enemies, dealing 4×3.5 Hex damage with life steal effects. Kills from this, however, restore 5% HP and grant 1 energy.
• Rank 15: Dark Inversion – Get 20% resistance to Dark and Hex elemental attacks; if any attack deals more than 20% of your max HP from these elements, gain 1 energy, yet Holy and Nature elements deal that much more damage toward you.
• Rank 20: Arkhaia Access – Achieve the ultimate rank to challenge the scariest boss ever, Arkhaia.

The Arkhaia Challenge

One boss most players have called awe-inspiring in Arcane Lineage is Arkhaia. This monster mage has a whopping 7,000 HP and seriously harmful damage-over-time mechanics.

This boss heralds the “Very Hard” difficulty type of bosses in the game, which makes strategy and teamwork coordination precisely the main foundations for taking it down.

For a successful encounter with Arkhaia, consider these strategies:

• A Fair Mixture of Classes– Bring high DPS classes, preferably Strength or Arcane-based, healing classes able to counter the DoT effects and damage-absorbing tanks.
• Management of DoTs– Make sure you have items for cleansing or getting healed over time with respect to Arkhaia’s primary mechanic.
• Preservation of Energy– Do not waste high-energy moves early. Save the big guns for when Arkhaia’s HP has dropped to 50%.
• Deft Movement– Keep agile to avoid area attack and never stack your party up.

The Ultimate Reward: Inferion Race

The true reward for mastering the Cult of Thanasius comes only after Arkhaia’s defeat. By winning, you get to opt to create a new character of the very powerful Inferion race with some special powers:

• Inferno Rift– A devastating fire attack scaling with Arcane.
• Demonic Rage– Resurrect once during every five battles to emerge with half HP, causing you to lose 5% HP every turn after that.
• Demonic Presence– Every 5 turns in combat, stacking buffs are granted that include +5% damage, +5% damage resistance, and +1 HP regeneration.

The Inferion works great in melee DPS builds, especially ones focused on Strength and Arcane. Past the Inferion race lies an even more shadowy Amorus race for the truly dedicated cultists.

This requires talking to Thanasius directly while giving him assorted artifacts from Level 35+. Amorous characters excel with Strength or Arcane DPS and have some cool powers of their own:

• Sinister Gaze– Deal damage while countering enemy buffs and sharing your debuffs.
• Undulating Hex– An efficient hex-based attack, striking with a massive blade.
• Passive immunities to stun and hexed status, causing your Atrius to become remarkably resilient.

Cult Progression In Arcane Lineage

For people wishing to maximize their Cult of Thanasius progression speed, a few have found means of advancing leveling faster. One prime example is as follows:

• Play one of the Blade Dancer, Vener, and Doan-Class
• Go to Deeproot and hunt for a Cursed Corpse enemy
• Use 100% Hairy Talent, allowing just 1 Echo Shard for the Blade Dancer
• Get the Cursed Corpse conditioned toward Darkness damage
• And Soul Absorb that poor low-HP fellow ad nauseam

It has been reported that this might reduce the ranks’ progressing time from a couple of days to about 2-3 hours, making the way forward to face Arkhaia a lot easier.