How to get the Marais Executioner’s Sword in Elden Ring

PSA: As of 3/9/22 the Marais Executioner's Sword, and possibly all Arcane scaling weapons are bugged and will not increase in strength with your stats, rendering them effectively useless. Bandai Namco support is aware of the issue and working on addressing it.

Damage bug notwithstanding, Elden Ring's Marais Executioner's Sword is a prime pick for a Strength/Arcane build, and this Legendary Armament is also a cute nod to the effective final boss of the entire Dark Souls series, Slave Knight Gael. Once it's fixed, you could do worse as far as Elden Ring weapons go.

The Marais Executioner's Sword's contribution to Elden Ring's ashes of war, Eochaid's Dancing Blade, lets you go full Jedi Academy mode and toss it like a lightsaber, performing a medium-long range drill attack with the sword floating in the air—very heavy metal. The weapon's requirements are as follows:

• Strength: 24 points, with theoretical C scaling at base
• Dexterity: 14 points, and E scaling (negligible)
• Arcane: 23 points, and D scaling at +0

It's quite a pain to acquire the Marais Executioner's Sword, a pain that's only magnified by its current broken state, but if you'd like to secure it for the day a fix comes, here's how:

Marais Executioner's Sword: Where to find the Shaded Castle

The Shaded Castle is one of Elden Ring's many indulgences of Hidetaka Miyazaki's poison swamp addiction, located in the northwestern Altus Plateau near Mt. Gelmir. This is a high-level area, one I found somewhat frustrating near level 90, and I would not recommend coming here below level 60.

The first site of grace here is located on the eastern half of the castle near a convenient breach in the walls. Don't be like me and keep throwing yourself on the western portion of the castle only to respawn leagues away.

You'll want to rush the central tower of the courtyard and take the ladder up—all the enemies are reasonably easy to avoid and the Depraved Perfumer encounters here are especially challenging.

Past the ladder, the central courtyard's portion of the poison swamp is deeper, and actively slows your character—keep to the solid ground on the left or right to make it to the stairs, then turn left at the top and follow that path. You'll quickly find a second site of grace. Proceeding forward from the stairs leads to an optional and frustrating fight with a fast-attacking centipede monster.

From the second site of grace, the level proceeds in a relatively linear fashion winding up the castle's bastion to the boss. There are two Cleanrot Knights on the path—one of which is aided by some of those classic Souls series rude canines. These encounters are more challenging than the castle's boss enemy, and worth using some of your resources on whatever Elden Ring spells, ashes of war, and physick you have at the ready.

The boss, Elemer of the Briar, is a bit of a pushover. He's especially susceptible to poise damage, so jump attacks are the name of the game. The arena is cluttered with feast tables and is on the small side, so ranged builds may have more trouble here.

Upon defeating Elemer, the currently bugged but undeniably cool Marais Executioner's Sword will be yours.