Summary

• New NPCs in Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree include Miquella's followers, with Needle Knight Leda guiding players through the new quests.
• Leda's side quest involves choices that don't impact boss fight summons, with players helping Leda or Hornsent, affecting quest progress.
• Completing individual NPCs' quests is more important than Leda's choices in determining events.

Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree introduces a host of new NPCs that the Tarnished encounters during their journey, providing a variety of new friends and enemies. Given the prevalence of Miquella in the teasers for this DLC, it's not surprising that his followers make an appearance. However, one devout follower of Miquella doesn't just make an appearance in the DLC, she becomes a guide for the Tarnished, helping them into and through the Realm of Shadow.

Needle Knight Leda, like the Tarnished, has been guided to Miquella's cocoon in order to follow them into the Realm of Shadow, where they now exist. In a way, this makes her the starting point for the Shadow of the Erdtree DLC, especially since she's the one who instructs the Tarnished on how to enter the Realm of Shadow. However, her guidance doesn't end there, and the Tarnished will be able to find notes from Leda as well as meet her in person at multiple points in the Realm of Shadow.

Needle Knight Leda's Side Quest In Shadow Of The Erdtree

How To Begin

After entering the Realm of Shadow, Needle Knight Leda won't physically appear again for a bit as the Tarnished follows the main questline. However, her presence can be felt during this time, since she guides the Tarnished with a series of messages left behind, which help lead them through the quests. Aside from her notes, Needle Knight Leda won't be found again until after the Tarnished has killed the Divine Beast Dancing Lion and finds her Tower of Shadow Message.

From there, Leda leaves more messages until the Tarnished comes across her again at Scadu Atlus at the Highroad Cross Site of Grace. After meeting her here, most of the Tarnished's encounters with her include small bits of dialogue, which are added to after the Tarnished explores other crosses on their map to meet characters like Dryleaf Dane and Hornsent. While there isn't much dialogue from her about these characters, she'll provide additional lore. Aside from that, her dialogue won't change drastically until after Miquella's Great Rune is broken.

Once the Great Rune is broken, Miquella's influence is removed from some of the groups following him. However, Leda is still devoted to him, and she'll eliminate any groups she feels either don't properly respect Miquella, or don't deserve to follow him. At this point, the Tarnished is asked for their opinion regarding who Leda should target.

Suggesting A Target To Needle Knight Leda

Does The Choice Matter?

Regardless of which choice the Tarnished makes, Needle Knight Leda decides to target Hornsent. Suggesting Thiollier simply makes Leda reflect on how Thiollier shows more devotion to St. Trina instead of Miquella, but she decides that she's okay with this since St. Trina and Miquella are basically the same person, and that means that he doesn't meet her requirements to be a threat to Miquella. Similarly, suggesting no one has Leda leads to the same conclusion that Thiollier isn't a threat with his devotion to St. Trina, but Hornsent is worth at least keeping an eye on.

Since this questline involves a choice, and the characters related to it can appear as summons during boss fights later, it seems like the option that the Tarnished picks impacts which summons they get later to help against characters like Messmer. However, this isn't actually the case, and the choice that the Tarnished makes when Leda asks for their opinion has no bearing on the summons they have access to for help against bosses later. Instead, summons are dependent on the Tarnished's progression and decisions during the questlines for the characters that have the potential to show up.

Gaining Hornsent As A Summon Against Messmer

Help Him With Revenge

While going through both Hornsent's and Leda's side quests, they more or less ignore each other until the Great Rune is broken and Miquella's influence that's been maintaining harmony is removed. Then, Leda decides that she should kill Hornsent because he poses the greatest threat to Miquella. However, Hornsent escapes before Leda is able to kill him, which means that the Tarnished can continue his questline.

Next, the Tarnished can choose to be summoned to help in the fight between Hornsent and Leda. Although neither character actually dies here, helping Leda against Hornsent ends his quest, meaning that the Tarnished is later unable to get his help against Messmer. Deciding to help Hornsent means that he can be a summon against Messmer, and the Tarnished gets the Swift Slash Ashes of War and 40,000 Runes from Leda. If the Tarnished sides with Hornsent, they'll be able to use the summon sign for him in the boss arena for Miquella.

Having Thiollier & Dryleaf Dane As Summons Against Bosses

Leda Has No Effect On Them

Thiollier and Dryleaf Dane are two other characters who are somewhat connected to Leda, but like Hornsent, the Tarnished's ability to summon Thiollier later depends on the completion of his individual quest rather than Leda's quest. Thiollier, in particular, can be summoned to help with what might be the hardest boss in the DLC, Promised Consort Radahn, so it's worth taking the time to complete his questline in order to summon him. In addition to Thiollier, Ansbach can be summoned for help against Radahn, making it even easier for the Tarnished.

Meanwhile, Dryleaf Dane isn't even an option that Leda offers, but finding him at the crosses on the map is also worthwhile. Since he's as devoted as Leda, she doesn't worry about him being a threat to Miquella or not deserving to continue following him after the Great Rune is broken. However, before the Tarnished actually meets him, he can be summoned for help against Rellana. Unfortunately, the Tarnished will always end up fighting against Dryleaf Dane in the legacy dungeon, no matter which choices are made.

When it comes to Needle Knight Leda asking the Tarnished to choose if she should target Thiollier, Hornsent, or no one, the option they pick doesn't actually matter. Instead, completing the quests of individual NPCs plays a much larger role in what events happen later and decides how much help they get against bosses. As a result, some choices are deceptive because they aren't as important as they might first appear in Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree.