Tales of Berseria Remastered: How to Escape Hellawes & Recruit Dyle

Escaping Hellawes is a two-phase sequence, and the reason people get lost is that the game never tells you the first exit gets closed behind you. The short version: sneak in through the storeroom tunnel, take the guild’s contract on Dyle, beat him in Hadlow Hollow, come back, discover your ship is unrepairable, then return to Hadlow Hollow a second time to recruit Dyle, storm the front gate, survive Teresa’s ambush, and win the dockside boss fight to sail out.

Two things save you the most time here: activating the warp point on your first pass through Hadlow Hollow, and remembering that the Bottomless Denore Bottle exists. Miss either and you’ll walk the same cave three times. Budget 60–90 minutes for the whole segment on a first run.

What the Remastered version changes

Tales of Berseria Remastered launched 27 February 2026 on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch and PC (some Steam regions show 26 February due to time-zone rollover). Several of its quality-of-life additions directly affect how this section plays:

• Destination icons — the single biggest change for Hellawes. The original left you guessing which building the guild office was; the remaster marks it.
• Encounter toggling — you can suppress random battles. Useful for the second Hadlow Hollow trip, dangerous on the first, since you’ll walk into Dyle underlevelled.
• Early Grade Shop access — available from the start rather than post-clear.
• Faster movement, autosave, retry after defeat, instant item pickups, half-price shop purchases and the option to skip already-seen events are all part of the remaster package.

Worth stating plainly: there’s no verifiable post-launch patch that changed item drops, difficulty tuning or UI in this section. The QoL features above shipped with the remaster itself. If a boss feels harder or easier than a 2016-era guide describes, that’s your build, not a balance patch.

Step 1 — Shipwreck to Hellawes’ main gate

After the Titania escape you crash near Hellawes. A young Malak boy heals Velvet and steals her compass; he matters later, so don’t chase him.

You’ll fight a daemon on the beach immediately. Use it to reacquaint yourself with the Liberation-LMBS system: string basic artes on one target with Velvet, and use Break Soul sparingly — it eats souls and leaves her open if you lean on it.

Follow the coastal path toward the destination icon. Grab every chest, including the Katz chest slightly off the marked route; early gear genuinely matters for the two boss fights ahead. At the gate the Malak boy returns your compass and bolts — follow him along the side of the gate area to a discreet storeroom entrance. This is the part people miss, circling the walls looking for a door that doesn’t exist.

Step 2 — Into the city via the tunnel

The storeroom is full of flamestone crates, a volatile local mineral. Note them; they pay off in step 10. Move through and follow the dug-out tunnel, which drops you at the docks. Stairs from there take you into Hellawes proper without passing a single guard.

Follow the destination icon to the smuggling guild’s office. The cutscene there brings in Rokurou, Magilou and Exorcist Teresa, who calls the Malak boy “Number Two” and confronts the guild about smuggling. The guild pins everything on a lizard-daemon named Dyle and offers to repair your ship if you kill him.

Step 3 — The weapon shop with Rokurou

Meet Rokurou at the marked weapon shop. It reads like a side errand but it’s a gated tutorial that unlocks two systems you’ll use for the rest of the game:

• Enhance — boost stats on weapons and armour you plan to keep.
• Dismantle — break down junk drops into upgrade materials.

Only enhance gear you’re confident you’ll hold for a while — Velvet’s and Rokurou’s current blades are safe. Dumping materials into random early drops you replace twenty minutes later is the classic waste here.

Step 4 — The village outside Hellawes

Leave through the same tunnel, then take the southwest exit from the docks map to reach a small village. You’ll meet another Exorcist, Eleanor, and a girl who tells you Dyle is hiding in a northern cave.

Before you leave: rest at the inn, and stock at least a couple of Apple Gels and Life Bottles each. You’ll want them for Dyle and, more urgently, for Teresa later. Take the north exit to Hadlow Hollow.

Step 5 — Hadlow Hollow, done efficiently

• Use the save point near the entrance.
• Activate the warp point as soon as you find it. This is the single most important action in the whole segment — it turns the second trip from a full cave crawl into a ten-second walk.
• Check the side rooms. The layout is mostly linear, but the branches hold useful early accessories and armour.

Fight most encounters rather than suppressing them. The remaster lets you toggle encounters off, and doing it here is how you arrive at Dyle underlevelled with no Grade banked. Push to the second save point near the large open chamber, save, check items, then go in.

Step 6 — Boss: Dyle

Dyle looks worse than he is. His threats:

• Frontal breath attack — long wind-up, then a cone straight ahead.
• Wide tail swipe — hits everything in melee range around him.
• Claw combos — punish you for tunnel-visioning on damage.

What works: control Velvet and circle to his sides or back. When he leans back for the breath, quickstep sideways (guard + direction) and punish from behind. Don’t spam Break Soul on cooldown — save it to close a combo when you’re sure you won’t be counter-hit. Leave Rokurou on Normal or Aggressive to maintain pressure and keep Magilou at range. If you get overwhelmed, disengage and let SC recover instead of forcing combos.

Dropping the difficulty one notch for this fight costs you nothing narratively and is far better than emptying your item pouch before Teresa. After the win, a cutscene reveals the guild is dirty and framing Dyle; Velvet cuts a deal and takes his tail as proof of death.

Step 7 — The Bottomless Denore Bottle

You receive it right after the Dyle scene and it’s easy to file away unread. It returns you instantly to the current dungeon’s entrance, free, with unlimited uses.

1. Open the menu.
2. Go to Items → Important Items.
3. Select Bottomless Denore Bottle and confirm.

Use it now instead of walking back through Hadlow Hollow. Then head to the village, the docks, and back through the tunnel to report to the guild. They “agree” to repair the ship, Rokurou pulls you back to the weapon shop for a check-in, and you head to the beached ship on the coast.

Step 8 — The trap closes

The guild delivers the bad news: the keel is destroyed, so no repair — you need an entirely new ship. Meanwhile a cutscene shows Teresa meeting her brother Oscar and swearing revenge for Titania. She sets a trap in Hellawes with Magilou as hostage.

When you try to go back in, the tunnel is sealed and the main gate is still guarded. Velvet’s answer is to go through the front — but first you need Dyle.

Step 9 — Recruiting Dyle

Return to Hadlow Hollow through the village. This is where the warp point pays for itself.

1. Touch the warp point in the first section to jump straight to the chamber before Dyle’s lair.
2. Talk to Dyle. There is no second fight. He agrees to help and to create a distraction using the flamestone.
3. Warp back to the entrance. Dyle appears outside with you.

If you skipped the warp point on your first pass, this is a full round trip through the cave in both directions.

Step 10 — Storming the gate and surviving the ambush

The gate battles are warm-ups. Lock onto one target at a time and burst it down; use Rokurou to stagger armoured enemies while Velvet finishes. Don’t burn Life Bottles unless someone actually goes down.

Inside, Hellawes is eerily empty — the civilians were cleared for the trap. Head to the marked point in the city centre to trigger it. You’ll face several waves of exorcists and Malaks while Teresa taunts you; this is a survival sequence, not a fight you’re meant to win cleanly. Dyle then detonates the flamestone storeroom, breaking Teresa’s formation, and the party breaks for the docks.

Step 11 — Boss: Teresa at the docks

Teresa plus two Malaks, with Velvet, Rokurou and Magilou. Going straight at Teresa is how this fight kills you — the Malaks spell-spam from range while she pressures you in melee.

1. Set the party to Focus Target in the battle strategy menu so everyone commits to the same enemy.
2. Lock onto one Malak and delete it. Interrupt its casts — the magic circles telegraph clearly — with fast combos.
3. Kill the second Malak. The fight becomes dramatically more manageable here.
4. Only then turn on Teresa.

Teresa favours linear spear thrusts and mid-range slashes, so quickstep sideways, never backwards — backing off keeps you inside the thrust line. Weave short combos with Velvet rather than overextending, let Rokurou trade up close to keep her staggered, and pull Magilou back to reposition if she gets focused. This is the fight your Apple Gels and Life Bottles are for; hoarding them is the mistake.

On higher difficulties Teresa and the Malaks can chain-stun you into a death loop. Lowering the difficulty temporarily changes nothing about the story.

Step 12 — Escaping by sea

Teresa orders Number Two to stop you; Velvet turns it around, grabbing him and forcing an arte that disables Teresa, Eleanor and her Malak. The party — Velvet, Rokurou, Magilou, Dyle and the Malak boy — hijacks a ship and sails.

Talk to the crew and your party on board; it sets up the next arc. Pirates attack shortly after, and since the ship isn’t built for naval combat, Velvet has Dyle steer for nearby land. That landing closes out the Hellawes segment.

FAQ

Do I have to fight Dyle twice?

No. The first encounter in Hadlow Hollow is a boss fight; the second visit is dialogue only, and he joins you.

Why is the tunnel into Hellawes blocked now?

It’s sealed as part of Teresa’s trap after the ship news. The front gate is the only route back in, which is why you need Dyle’s flamestone distraction first.

What level should I be for Teresa?

There’s no hard gate, but if you suppressed encounters through Hadlow Hollow you’ll feel it. Fighting normally on the first cave trip puts you in comfortable range for both bosses.

Did the remaster change this section?

Only through its quality-of-life layer — destination icons, encounter toggling, faster movement, autosave, retry-after-defeat and early Grade Shop access. No patch has been documented as altering drops, difficulty or the encounter design here.

Carrying on

Everything else we’ve written about the game lives on the Tales of Berseria Remastered hub. When you’re through the Hellawes arc and the story opens up, our late-game walkthrough and Innominat guide picks the thread back up at the other end of the campaign. If you’re still deciding which version to play, we covered what the Switch and Xbox release actually adds beyond nostalgia.