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Hollow Knight: Silksong > Guides > Mary's Guides
569 ratings
Speedrunner Achievement Guide
By Mary
Guide and route to help with beating the game under 5 hours.
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Created by
Mary
Online
Category: Achievements, Walkthroughs
Languages: English
Posted
Updated
9 Sep @ 11:55am
18 Sep @ 10:58am
21,584 Unique Visitors
1,250 Current Favorites
Guide Index
Overview
Introduction 
Route Overview 
Route and Guide 
Credits 
Comments
Introduction
Hey so i just did the speedrunner achievement and wanted to make a guide because this great higher quality guide helped me get the achievement in the first game, also this game is so incredibly beautiful and it's everything on my mind rn. My run was pretty close but i wasted like an hour on an arena because i completely forgot about the pinmaster and didn't buy bell stations. All to say the time limit is pretty generous and i think if u beat the game you can probably do it.

Spoilers
just in case

This route isn't very optimized for comfort so grabbing some tools or a skill on the way will make the run easier i'll mention some i thought of after doing the run but i haven't tested them. Let me know if u have suggestions for upgrades to put in the route.

Did a second attempt to show that there is quite a bit of spare time. I still had plenty of deaths and its by no means a speedrun but i wanted to show that i really did just waste 1 hour on that arena.
Route Overview
  1. Play with bell beast
  2. Get Dash
  3. Defeat Lace
  4. Get Hover
  5. Defeat Moorwing
  6. Get Claw
  7. Defeat Widow
  8. Defeat Cogwork Dancers
  9. Get Melodies
  10. Defeat Lace again
  11. Defeat Grandmother Silk
Route and Guide
Path order is:
Red > Dark Blue > Yellow > Pink > Green > Light Blue > Yellow again > Purple > White
sorry for using Yellow twice i forgot i already used it at the start
I'll mark optional Benches with an O on the route and arenas with an A.
The achievement goes by ingame time so you can pause the game and take breaks (map and inventory probably count aswell)


Bone Bottom - The Marrow

Red path:
  1. Get to Bone Bottom
  2. Get Silkspear
Dark Blue path:
    O: Bench
  1. Defeat Bell Beast


Deep Docks

Dark Blue path:
    O: Bench closer to Dash (arena ahead)
  1. Get Dash

Yellow path:
    O: u can bench closer to Lace but its locked behind an arena
  1. Defeat Lace


Optional Upgrades (Warding Bell, Craftmetal)

(thx to King Ultimax in the comments for suggesting the Craftmetal)
Warding Bell is a good defensive option and the Craftmetal can be used to get 4 tools on the way (2.5 of which are usefull imo).

Yellow path:
  1. Get Warding Bell
  2. Get Craftmetal
    This can be used to get either the Cogwork Wheel or Sawtooth Circlet at the Twelth Architect or later on in High Halls to craft the Cogflies if you don't have enough rosaries for the other two.
  3. Continue to Seamstress


Far Fields

Yellow path:
  1. Talk to the Seamstress and accept the wish
  2. Farm the spines then quit to bench (u can respawn the enemies that drop them by exiting and reentering the room at the transition to the right)
  3. Get Cloak

Pink path:
  1. Defeat Fourth Chorus and go up to Greymoor through Pilgrim's Rest


Optional Upgrades (Thread Storm, Threefold Pin)

Getting Thread Storm and Threefold Pin provides more offensive options. Thread Storm is good aoe and helps with arenas and Threefold Pin is good dmg against bigger bosses (beware of shell costs tho).

Pink path:
  1. Bench at Shakra (arena ahead)
  2. Beat the arena inside the Craw Lake building
  3. Get Thread Storm
  4. Get Threefold Pin
    O: Bench at the Bellshrine


Greymoor

Pink path:
  1. Bench at Halfway Home (arena ahead)
  2. Unlock the shortcut
  3. Defeat Moorwing


Bellhart - Shellwood

Pink path:
  1. Bench at Bellhart (arena ahead)
    O: There is an enemy pogo to skip Sister Splinter (example video)
  2. Get Claw

Greenpath:
  1. Defeat Widow
  2. Buy the Bellhart Bellway station
  3. Get the first nail upgrade


Greymoore - Sinner's Road

Greenpath:
  1. Unlock Elevator
  2. Bench at Halfway Home for Sinners road
    O: Unlock shortcut
  3. Solve The Mist
  4. Bench inside of Exhaust Organ top left
  5. Defeat Phantom


Citadel entry

Greenpath:
  1. Bench at Grand Bellway and buy the station if u can't there will be another chance later
  2. Bench at Songclave
  3. Defeat Cogwork Dancers
  4. Unlock the lower door
  5. Unlock the upper door
  6. Get Pale Oil

Light Blue path:
  1. Bench at Grand Bellway and buy the station if u didn't earlier (farm rosaries in the room to the left of the station if u can't afford it)
    Travel to Bellhart and get the second nail upgrade
  2. Defeat Trabbio back at Grand Bellway


The Cauldron

Light Blue path:
  1. Bench at the Architect
  2. Get Harpoon
  3. Take the path below elevator


Citadel again

Light Blue path:
  1. Bench and get the Sacred Cylinder

Yellow path again:
  1. Get the 1st melody (give cylinder to collector)
  2. Bench at Songclave and make your way to High Halls


High Halls

Yellow path again:
  1. Bench infront of High Halls
  2. Bench after High Halls (arena ahead)
    Beat the hardest Boss in the game this arena took like 1 hour without any nail upgrades gl
  3. Get the 2nd melody and follow purple path back to Dancers


Cogwork Core

Purple path:
  1. Bench below Cogwork Dancers
  2. Solve Core "puzzle" and get the 3rd melody

White path:
  1. Bench below Cogwork Dancers one last time
  2. Defeat Lace again


The Cradle

White path:
  1. Bench at Terminus
  2. Unlock shortcut
  3. Defeat Grandmother Silk


Hope this helps some people if you have feedback let me know.
GL on your runs!

Credits
Guide inspiration: Hollow Knight - 5 Hour Speedrun Achievement Guide by fireb0rn
Full Map image: Post by u/Zignixx
Sister Splinter skip: Video by DuoRue
162 Comments
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Subvers 9 Oct @ 1:14pm 
Great guide! Beat it at 4:37 second try, first one was ruined by High Hals gauntlet >_<
During second attempt made detour to collect 4 mask shards( bone bottom for 300 rosaries, veavenest atla, deep docks entrance, and entrance of wormways)
Beans Cooked in Pineapple Sauce 9 Oct @ 2:11am 
4:12, Steel soul included. Altered the route to get bone mask immediately after getting dash, and died a few times mapping out the route. Beat it on my 9th try after my 8th attempt had a painful skill issue at cogwork dancers, featuring pollip pouch for the high halls gauntlet and a trip to whiteward for fast heal for the final stretch. 9/10 guide, looking back there were some missed mask shards, but still would've had a way harder time without it
Arlink1703 8 Oct @ 11:30am 
3:34, first try. I forgot to upgrade my nail a second time, so I had to go back to the station before getting the second melody and then go back. I beat Trabbio with a weak nail and didn't do any skips.

Thanks for the guide. It was kinda simple, but I really missed extra masks at some moments.
Arakus 8 Oct @ 6:31am 
https://www.reddit.com/r/HollowKnight/comments/1nkr09m/demystifying_the_mist_detailed_mechanics_guide/ this might be worth linking for people who r rlly bad at the mist, i strongly recommend juggling M6 (see the google docs thing in the video description)
sa02 8 Oct @ 1:35am 
Very useful guide! I was able to finish in under 3h 38 minutes. For anyone having trouble with the High Halls gauntlet, know that you can load an autosave (like the one you got after learning the Vaults melody) if you need to try the fight again instead of restarting your whole run. Buying the tool damage upgrade from the Forge Daughter also helped me a bit with the last two guys.

Anyway, good luck anyone else trying this!
geaneyaidan 6 Oct @ 5:17pm 
Finished in 2:59:15!!! When I was starting I would have been delighted to have just gotten the achievement at all, but when I beat the High Halls gauntlet on my first try (popped off so hard) I realised a sub-3 hour was on. I was surprised by how much trickier I found GM Silk without the Injector Band and higher health; found that to be the hardest fight of the run. Knew it was gonna be close and so happy to have gotten the sub-3.

Only routing differences were returning to Bone Bottom just before Trobbio to pick up 2 mask shards + evolved Hunter's. Not sure the Craw Lake detour is at all worth it by the way, yeah Thread Storm is goated but the parry is a great spell too and you necessarily pick that one up, and Threefold Pins is pretty meh considering Straight Pin and Cogfly are basically along the way.

Just a really clean run if I do say so myself, especially in Act 2. Only deaths were:

- Phantom: 3
- Lace: 3
- Grand Mother Silk: 5

Thanks for making it possible with the guide! :)
The Way 6 Oct @ 3:41pm 
my time is 4:57))) it was much closer than I would have liked
Thanks for the guide!
☺﴾CassetteCobra﴿☺ 6 Oct @ 2:56pm 
Got a time of 2:46 Thanks to this guide and the helpful tip by Tiny-Al making the High Hall Gauntlet so much easier. Death wise I did about 7 times, mostly from one boss.
teejwb 6 Oct @ 9:48am 
3h43m thanks to this guide! Took some detours to recruit Garmond and Zaza for both Moorwing and High Halls Gauntlet. Grabbed Jubilana on the way to meet Garmond and Zaza in the citadel so I could use the Ascenders Grip cheese for the HH gauntlet (I’m not a very good fighter without tools). Being able to hang out on the wall while Garmond and Zaza beat up the boss duo saved my blood pressure.

Thank you for this!
not burger 5 Oct @ 2:30pm 
arakus if you havent restarted yet then you should because that gauntlet in high halls will probably knock off way too much time so you're better off trying again