In Assassin’s Creed Valhalla you can find some items that need to be delivered, a list of people who want those items, and their locations. But to bring each person their specific item you’ll need to do some walking, like Sam Porter in Death Stranding. Turns out, this isn’t just a coincidence...
How to find this quest and its connection to 2019's PS4 exclusive Death Stranding comes via a tip sent to Kotaku. It turns out this questline and Easter egg were a bit too well hidden and nobody seems to have found it yet
So, here’s the Easter egg and how to find it.
Early on in Valhalla you and your clan take over an old settlement. As you play the game, you earn materials that let you upgrade the place, adding new buildings and areas. One of these potential upgrades you can get is a small trading outpost where you can buy and sell items. This is the key to finding the Easter egg and secret Death Stranding questline.
Behind the shop, you’ll find a list of four customers on it. Also behind the shop are four different objects that you can pick up and carry. If you take the list to the shopowner, a lady named Yanli, she’ll explain that these people haven’t come to pick up their items. That’s where you come in, as you suggest the option of delivering each item to the correct customer.
Using the list and the information on it, you can figure out where each item needs to go, and then you have to actually carry it there, just like in Death Stranding. The first item I delivered was a stone slab to a farm about 2600 meters away. On horseback, this would be fast. But when holding a heavy item you can’t ride a horse, so I had to walk it there. It took about 15 minutes and a little extra to find the specific farm, but once I did the woman was excited she got her item and paid me some silver.
Here’s a tip to save some time: You can place these items on a boat. I still recommend one at a time so you don’t drop one or have one despawn and force you to fast travel back to your base to start over. But you can use a small rowboat or your own longboat to help move things along.
The big reward for doing all of this is... I don’t know! My quest bugged out and I think I know why. I delivered all the items first then talked to the shopowner. This meant we had the conversation about delivering things and then had a conversation about me doing it all in the span of a minute. This seems to have tripped things up.
Regardless, even without a funny or handsome reward, this secret quest is a nice and fairly accurate Death Stranding reference. Walking around the world of Valhalla, carrying a big box, makes you think differently. Deep rivers are now dangerous and need a boat or bridge to cross to avoid dropping your precious cargo. Tall cliffs can’t be scaled easily, instead, you need to find your way around. In the process of delivering these items, I ended up locating some new spots I had missed before, which was a nice reminder of how big this world is and how easy it is to miss the small things when you are fast traveling and rushing around from quest to quest.
I recommend, if you plan on doing this secret quest, to play some Low Roar and drink some Monter Energy, to really nail that Death Stranding vibe.