You’re Meant to Fail Scarlet Hollow Chapter 5… Unless You Do This

Why Chapter 5 Kept Wrecking My Runs

After spending a few playthroughs untangling Chapter 5 of Scarlet Hollow, I realized how easy it is to miss crucial clues in the Forbidden Wing or stumble straight into a hard fail at the Tremaine Farmstead. My first run, I rushed the manor, barely explored, and walked into the farm sequence totally unprepared. The second, I pushed Tabitha too hard and learned the hard way that this chapter absolutely will kill you for bad decisions.

This guide walks through Chapter 5 as I wish I’d played it the first time: a step-by-step, trait-aware route that:

• Shows both starting points (Stella’s house vs. waking in the manor)
• Maps every important Forbidden Wing room to its lore and trait checks
• Explains the crossroads choices on your way out of the manor
• Details how each companion changes the Tremaine Farmstead showdown
• Highlights the big hard fail to avoid with Tabitha
• Covers the dream/memory sequence and how to save Kaneeka with the right build

I’ll keep the focus on mechanics and consequences so you can preserve as much narrative surprise as possible, but expect some spoilers for Chapter 5’s events.

Step 1 – Your Morning Start: Stella’s House vs. the Manor

If You Stayed with Stella

On my main run I woke up at Stella’s place. Head into the kitchen, talk to her over pancakes, and be decent to her if you care about your relationship. Over breakfast, you can:

• Talk about Reese and the previous night
• Discuss Wayne’s warning from Chapter 4
• Make plans to check the Forbidden Wing of the mansion

Once you’ve exhausted the conversation, you and Stella will head to Scarlet Manor together. Having Stella with you in the Forbidden Wing slightly changes how you handle some physical obstacles (she effectively acts as extra muscle if you don’t have Powerful Build), and her reactions also color the horror beats.

If You Stayed at the Manor

If you slept at the manor, you wake up already in the Forbidden Wing, in a hidden hallway.

• If Dustin and his mom are there, the Talk to Animals trait lets you actually speak with them. They don’t add much beyond confirming Wayne carried you here, but it’s nice flavor and reinforces who dragged you into the Wing.
• Peek through the keyhole into the guest bedroom – you can see it, but you can’t meaningfully interact with it yet.
• Your only real option is to start exploring deeper into the wing and follow the layout I’ll outline next.

Either way, you end up in the same space: the Forbidden Wing, with Wayne’s presence lingering in the background and a thin linear path that hides a lot of optional lore if you just bee-line the footprints.

Step 2 – Clearing the Forbidden Wing (Without Missing Key Clues)

My big mistake on my first pass was following Wayne’s footprints and ignoring side rooms. Don’t do that. This is where you pick up the best stone seal info and family lore, and several trait checks only appear here.

Ornate Entryway & Enoch’s Secret Office

In the ornate entryway, examine everything:

• The large painting – This shows the locations where you’ve already found stone seals. One location remains unmarked, hinting that there’s still a missing seal out there. This visual reminder sets up your “seek the next seal” option later.
• The hidden room / secret office – This is Enoch’s office, and it’s the single most important lore room in the wing.

Inside Enoch’s office, trait checks matter a lot:

• Booksmart: You can recognize and piece together the old documents on the wall and desk, effectively discovering a map that ties the family records to the seal locations. This is huge for understanding what’s going on.
• Mystical: When you inspect the glass vials, you realize they’re part of a magical communication system, not just weird lab samples. It reframes what Enoch was doing down here.
• Street-Smart: You can spot and open a hidden drawer in the desk, which contains detailed information on the stone seals and their purpose. Without this, you’re flying more blind when people start talking seals and “deals” later.

Also check:

• Bottom drawer: Dustin and his mom are hidden here along with more vials. The game is not subtle about Enoch’s ethics.
• Top drawer: A photo of Theodore, tying back to your vision in the previous chapter.

Once you’ve ransacked this room, do not skip it on any run. Even if you plan to replay later, this is where a lot of the chapter’s logic starts to click.

Third-Floor Hallway & Powerful Build Gate

Back in the hallway, follow Wayne’s footprints but stop to interact:

• Check the window to see the drop outside – it reinforces that you’re effectively trapped on this side.
• One nearby door is blocked by heavy boxes. If you have Powerful Build, you can move them yourself. If you’re with Stella, she can help you work around some obstacles even if you lack the trait. Without either, that room stays locked this run.

This is a good early example of how traits and companions affect simple exploration, not just dialogue.

Edwardine’s Room

In Edwardine’s room, loot carefully:

• Drawer with greeting cards: These are from Tabitha’s dad. They’re easy to skim past, but they matter in conversations with Tabitha later in this chapter. On my first run I didn’t connect how important they’d be to softening her a bit.
• Closet: Clothes and a very unsettling note. It’s mainly lore but deepens the family’s history.

Once done, head back out and hit the next room.

The Nursery

In the nursery:

• Check the bookshelf for handwritten books by Alexandra Scarlet. They strongly imply she may have switched places with a “boy in the walls,” feeding into the whole Alexandra/doll storyline.
• Look at the drawings. They provide extra context for the strange family arrangements in previous chapters.

Nothing here is trait-gated, but it gives important backstory that makes the next rooms hit harder.

Ritual Room – Seals and Blood

This room is easy to misread as just “creepy ambiance” if you don’t have the right traits. Pay attention to:

• Central rug and symbol – With Mystical or Keen Eye, you can pull back the rug or curtains to expose an occult symbol tied to the five stone seals, with a sixth power indicated in the center.
• Behind the curtain – You can find a bloody offering setup, tucked away from casual view. It makes clear that this isn’t just symbolic; real sacrifices have happened here.

This is the moment where the game visually says, “Yes, everything going on with the seals is part of one big ritual system.” It also primes you for what you’ll later see under the Tremaine farm.

The Locked Room & Alexandra’s Doll

In the locked room you finally find Alexandra’s missing doll – the one from your own closet.

• Examining the doll with Stella present absolutely freaks her out.
• Right after, you hear piano music from down the hall. Whether you came alone or with Stella, this is your cue to move toward the music.

Piano Room – Confronting Wayne

The piano room is one of Chapter 5’s most tense scenes. Wayne is here, and you finally get a direct conversation instead of just stalking and threats. How much he tells you depends partly on how you’ve treated him before, but the big mechanical point is this:

• To unlock the “Find the Witch” path later, you need to actually talk to Wayne here. If you somehow avoid engaging with him, that option doesn’t appear at the later crossroads.

My advice: stay calm, ask questions, don’t try to be a tough guy. You can’t fight him here anyway, and his perspective is one of the few windows into what’s truly happening in Scarlet Hollow.

Step 3 – Leaving the Manor: Crossroads & Who to Visit

Once you’re out of the Forbidden Wing, the game throws a bunch of choices at you – but they all funnel to the same destination: the Tremaine Farmstead. What changes is:

• Which options appear (based on traits and prior choices)
• Who accompanies you to the farm (your companion)
• Who’s already on-site when you arrive

In broad strokes, your options look like this:

• Hunt the “Witch” – Only appears if you spoke with Wayne in the piano room.
• Seek out the next stone seal – Pays off all the seal/map lore you just gathered; ultimately this leads you toward the farmstead.
• Talk to Tabitha – Usually means heading out to the mines and confronting her with what you’ve learned.
• Go to the police – Brings the authorities into play, with mixed results.
• Talk to someone you trust, such as:
  • Stella
  • Kaneeka (only if you have Mystical)
  • Oscar (how helpful he is depends on how you handled the library haunting)
  • Avery (only if you involved him earlier in the story)
  • Sybil
  • Doc Kelly (if she’s alive)
  • Reese (if he’s alive and depending on his state)
  • Bo, and Duke if he survived Episode 1
• Attempt to flee town – You can try, but the story finds a way to drag you back.

It’s worth knowing that only Stella, Doc Kelly, Tabitha, and Avery can actually become your companions for the trip to the Tremaine Farm. Everyone else is more about flavor, context, and small branches.

Critical Warning: Don’t Try to Overpower Tabitha

If you go to see Tabitha at the mines, she’s likely armed and on edge. On one of my runs, our relationship was rocky and I thought, “Fine, I’ll just use my traits and force the issue.”

Do NOT use a combination of Powerful Build and Street-Smart to physically overpower Tabitha. If you try to take control of the situation that way, she panics and shoots you dead. That’s a full chapter hard fail, not a fake-out.

Instead:

• Use the greeting cards from Edwardine’s room to open her up a bit.
• Lean into empathy and shared danger rather than threats.
• Accept that in this scene, you’re not the one holding the power, and play accordingly.

If Tabitha does come with you, or if you end up arrested, you still wind up at the same farmstead, just in different configurations.

Step 4 – Tremaine Farmstead: How Each Companion Route Plays Out

No matter how you navigate the crossroads, the story drags you to the Tremaine Farmstead. This is Chapter 5’s big confrontation, and it’s where traits like Keen Eye really pay off.

Arriving with Avery

This is one of my favorite routes mechanically. With Avery:

• You arrive before the police and before Doc Kelly.
• You get a bit of time to talk with Irma Calloway, and Duke too if he survived Episode 1.
• Bo has already gone into the Tremaine house and hasn’t come out.
• You follow Avery into the garage and see the remains of Big Betty, then head down into the root cellar.
• In the cellar you find Julius, Bo, and Julius’ horrific “son,” along with the next seal. You pass out at the sight of it, and when you come to, the others (police, Duke, Doc Kelly) have arrived.

This is where Keen Eye becomes crucial:

• With Keen Eye, you can work with Avery to notice the details that let you talk Julius into letting his “son” feed from him instead and releasing Bo. This keeps Bo alive and prevents extra deaths.
• Without Keen Eye, your main alternatives are:
  • Kill the “son” – This saves Bo, but both Julius and Deputy Franklin die as a consequence.
  • Let the “son” finish feeding on Bo – Mechanically viable, but morally horrible, and other characters will treat you like the real monster here.

On my “best outcome” run, I used Keen Eye and saved both Bo and the deputy. If you have the trait, aim for that.

Arriving with Tabitha

If you made peace with Tabitha (or at least avoided getting shot), she rides with you to the farm.

• The police are already inside, along with Duke.
• Doc Kelly is outside with Irma.
• You and Tabitha head in and find Sheriff Hugby already dead from a trap – complete with a fresh axe in his face.
• You move into the basement and encounter Julius, Avery, the “son,” and Deputy Franklin.
• At the sight of the seal, both you and Tabitha pass out, triggering another vision.

When you come back, you have to decide how to resolve the “son” situation, just like in the Avery route. Keen Eye still enables the same non-lethal solution. The difference is mostly in how Tabitha reacts and what this experience does to your relationship.

Arriving with Doc Kelly

This route plays very similarly to arriving with Avery:

• You and Doc head into the house and down into the basement.
• Julius, Avery, and the “son” are already there, with Deputy Franklin present.
• You witness the seal, black out into the vision, then come back to the flooded, tense reality.
• You still control the crucial choice about Bo, Julius, and the “son.”

Doc Kelly adds some medical perspective and moral commentary, but mechanically, your options mirror the Avery path. Again: use Keen Eye if you have it.

Arriving with Stella

With Stella as your companion, the beats are almost the same:

• You enter the house together.
• Make your way down to the basement.
• Encounter Julius, the “son,” and the seal.
• Pass out into the same Enoch/Verena vision.
• Wake up and choose how to handle the “son.”

The big difference here is emotional. If you’ve built a strong relationship with Stella, her reactions to the horror and to your choices land much harder, but your critical mechanical path doesn’t change: Keen Eye remains the best way to avoid extra deaths.

Arriving in the Patrol Car

If things went badly with Tabitha or the authorities, you might roll up in the back of a patrol car instead of with a friendly companion.

• You’re initially stuck outside, listening to the situation inside escalate.
• At a key moment, Wayne quietly opens the patrol car door and lets you out, but refuses to go inside with you.
• Doc Kelly joins you, and you both head into the house and down to the basement.
• You find the sheriff dead, then trigger the same seal vision and face the same Julius/“son” decision as the other routes.

So no matter how messy your pre-farm choices were, the core confrontation is essentially the same – it’s just your support network and guilt that change.

Step 5 – The Vision, the Flood, and Saving Kaneeka

Once you see the seal in the basement, the game rips you out of the present. You experience a vision of Enoch making his deal with the witch, Verena, and when you “return,” the scene begins to warp.

The faucet starts running, the room floods, and the UI itself changes. You’re effectively in a dream or memory space, and you need to work through it to finish the chapter.

Here’s what tripped me up at first:

• You’re presented with multiple conversation branches about your daughters’ deaths over the years. It feels like you’re “failing” if you accept them, but progressing the scene actually requires you to walk through and accept each of those losses.
• Don’t be afraid to exhaust every dialogue option; the scene is designed to funnel you toward acceptance, not reward you for denial.

Eventually, you encounter Kaneeka within this dream-space. You can:

• Try to talk her out of the choice she’s making. If your relationship with her is strong, you’ll get slightly more tender or persuasive lines, but she still pushes toward her decision.
• If you have Powerful Build, you unlock a critical option: physically pulling her out of the dream.

With Powerful Build, you can literally grab her and drag her back, and you both wake up at Tetanus Lake. Without that trait, your influence is limited to words, and the scene resolves much more bleakly.

Between Keen Eye at the farmstead and Powerful Build here, Chapter 5 is very upfront about rewarding specific builds. On later runs, I built characters specifically to see each outcome, but for a “best lives saved” run, Keen Eye + Powerful Build is incredibly strong.

Putting It All Together – A Clean, Low-Body-Count Route

If you want a solid first clear of Chapter 5 with minimal irreversible disaster, here’s what I recommend based on my own trials:

• In the Forbidden Wing:
  • Thoroughly explore every room before chasing Wayne’s footprints.
  • Use Booksmart and Street-Smart (if you have them) to squeeze Enoch’s office for all its map and seal info.
  • Use Mystical or Keen Eye in the ritual room to fully reveal the symbol and blood altar.
  • Pick up Edwardine’s greeting cards for later.
  • Talk to Wayne in the piano room to unlock the “Witch” angle and extra context.
• At the crossroads:
  • Choose a companion who can actually come with you – Avery or Doc Kelly are great mechanically, Stella is great emotionally, Tabitha is high-risk but rewarding if handled carefully.
  • Never try to overpower Tabitha with brute-force trait checks.
• At the Tremaine Farmstead:
  • Prioritize Keen Eye to push Julius into feeding his “son” from himself and releasing Bo.
  • Avoid letting the “son” finish feeding on Bo unless you’re explicitly chasing a darker route.
  • Understand that killing the “son” costs Julius and Deputy Franklin their lives.
• In the dream sequence:
  • Work through all the grief and acceptance options; don’t fight the scene.
  • If you have Powerful Build, use it to pull Kaneeka out at the crucial moment and wake at Tetanus Lake.

Chapter 5 is designed to feel overwhelming and unfair on a blind run. But once you know where the trait gates and hard fails are, it becomes a tense, manageable puzzle instead of a gotcha. If I could go from getting shot by my own cousin to walking out of the farmstead with Bo and the deputy still breathing, you can absolutely do it too.