Wilhelmina clearly has a hold on this town, but she’s also holding onto a grudge. Every Rose Has Its Thorn is an awkwardly hidden quest, required if you want to romance Wilhelmina in Dragon’s Dogma 2. Let’s make a courtesan happy.
How to start Every Rose Has Its Thorn
Once you’ve completed some of Dragon’s Dogma 2‘s prerequisite quests, you can start Every Rose Has Its Thorn by talking with Wilhelmina a few times and gifting her items in the Rose Chateau in Vernworth. Once she reaches a certain affection level with you, sleep at the Stardrop Inn and return to the Chateau. If you’ve done it right, Rolf blocks the door to her room, preventing you access. To begin the quest itself, you’ll need to spy on her.
This quest, an essential part of the Wilhelmina romance saga, requires you to first complete The Stolen Throne and An Unexpected Visitor quests. These are the two quests with scenes involving our favorite lady of the night saving us from the Vernworth Castle guards. Once you’ve done them both, you should be ready to begin her quest.
If you’re having trouble finding Wilhelmina, she’s in the room where you spy on Arthur during his night on the town; head up the winding staircase and cross to the other side of the balcony to reach her room through the double doors.
Depending on what part of the game you’re in, you may have to clear out dialogue before you can start Every Rose Has Its Thorn. For example, our Wilhelmina was quite fond of the Phantom Oxcart rumor and didn’t let us start her quest at all. We had to complete Phantom Oxcart and then sleep at an Inn to get her to talk about something else. In addition, you’ll need to lavish her with gifts and improve her mood beforehand. Talk with her and hand over Bouquets of Flowers until she talks about how other men want to keep her for themselves, but that you’re different. That means she’s ready to give you the quest, at long last. Take a nap at an inn and then visit her again either in the morning or at night.
Rolf blocks the door and says she’s with another patron, but that doesn’t mean we can leave the proprietress to herself, right? Head into the room through the double doors and check out the right wall. If you move a painting aside, you can watch her turn down Ser Allard before she notices you. This officially begins the quest. You have three days to get her evidence of the nobleman’s misdeeds or she’ll just slit his throat. Let’s get her that evidence, shall we?
Finding the evidence
To complete Every Rose Has Its Thorn, you must collect the Murder Report and bring it to Wilhelmina. However, you can get a slightly easier quest if you gather two pieces of evidence instead and bring them to Brant. This really doesn’t do much for the quest, but it works well for completionists and provides you an easier escape route during the ending sequence.
Bribery Investigation Findings
The Bribery Investigation Findings are significantly easier to find than the other piece of evidence, so they’ll be our first target. They’re on a desk in this home in Vernworth, directly next to Clovis’s Barbarie. Grab that and bring it to Brant.
Brant will take the Bribery Investigation Findings first and recommend you talk to Sven about the Murder Report. He doesn’t love being implicated in the assassination of a noble, but Allard’s death would clear the way for gathering more evidence.
This part of the quest is fully optional. From what we can tell, you don’t even get more rewards for bringing Brant into this, and Allard’s deeds are condoned as fully unsalvageable either way. However, it’s such an easy step that makes the endgame of the quest simpler, so we recommend doing it anyways.
Murder Report
To get the Murder Report, we must begin as all infiltration quests do; we need to find our Regentkin Sven. Head into Castle Vernworth through the guardhouse and talk with the chap in his room, just like you do during Disa’s Plot. This stealth mission usually causes no issues, since the guards seem rather lax about the Arisen walking about the place. We always like to keep in the shadows just in case.
Sven offers nothing but his word that you can visit a lord named Patrick, a noble who has a vendetta against Allard. Head down to Patrick’s estate during the night. The lord was standing the middle of his living room for us, ready to be of service. He’ll offer to call down Allard whenever you’d like—simply click “Agree” whenever you want to do this timed event. If you’re worried, you can rest in an Inn before the event so you can revert the save, but you’ll have plenty of time.
Head up the hill to Allard’s home once he’s out of it and loot the joint. Since Patrick’s men were kind enough to step away, you shouldn’t get called out by anyone—explore to your heart’s content, including the prone body of Allard’s soon-to-be widow. The Murder Report is behind the painting in the room just up the stairs. There’s one or two bags of gold you can collect on your way out the door, but make sure you peel out of there before Allard gets home or you’ll have a headache to deal with.
It is not required to talk with Sven at all to get the Murder Report. It always spawns behind the painting, so you can beat Allard’s guard to death and nab it if you want. However, if you do talk to the boy, you can both avoid a murder and possibly turn in quests like Veil of Gossamer Shadow.
Assassinating Allard
When Wilhelmina asks if you will help kill Allard or not, we almost exclusively recommend killing the corrupt lord. It’s required for her romance, and the reward for turning Wilhelmina in to Allard is far worse for you overall. Considering all he’s done to the kingdom of Vernworth, it’s probably for the best to sweep him under the carpet.
If you agree to help Wilhelmina, simply walk into the room Allard is in, hold your Grapple button (RT, R2, E) to tackle him, and let the cutscene play out. It turns out the proprietress has a personal connection to some of Allard’s misdeeds, so this was a bit of vengeance for her.
After the cutscene, guards immediately run upstairs to talk to you and your courtesan friend. You both escape out of the nearby window. This is the point where not talking to Brant beforehand can be a bit of a chore. Without his help, you’re more likely to run into guards, and your Pawns really, really don’t like guards. He’ll spirit you away to safety, where you can wait at an inn for things to die down.
If you don’t talk to Brant, to prevent your Sorcerer from raining meteors on the city, we recommend telling your Pawns to wait a fair distance away or dismissing them entirely. Sprint down towards the Stardrop Inn and take a nap—doesn’t matter how long you sleep. The guards have a very short attention span, so you’ll be safe after your snooze.
To officially turn in the quest, head back to the Rose Chateau the following day and talk with Wilhelmina. She is obviously quite thankful for your aid and rewards you with a night of passionate implied fun. Afterwards, you’ll be kicked out onto the street 8,500 gold richer, 1,400 experience gained, and with the Ring of Benevolence. The Ring restores HP over time after you take a big hit—a Band-Aid on a bullet wound, but can be helpful to prevent a death.
