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Silksong The Slab walkthrough and Apostate Key location

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The Apostate Key, Heretic Key, and Indolent Key are all needed to escape The Slab in Silksong

The Slab in Silksong
(Image credit: Team Cherry)
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The Slab in Silksong is a major challenge, especially for those looking for the location of the Apostate Key. Players might stumble across The Slab while exploring, but there's also the risk of getting kidnapped by a bug with a cage and finding yourself teleported there, with your cloak, needle and gear all taken away, an unprecedented challenge for Hollow Knight Silksong.

If this is how you're introduced to the Slab, you won't be able to do anything else until you escape this grim prison complex. Fortunately, I've done it myself and can lay out a clear walkthrough to help guide you through, as well as lay out the location of the Key of Apostate, which will allow you to reach all the optional areas within The Slab – and a terrifying boss fight.

Full walkthrough for The Slab in Silksong

(Image credit: Team Cherry)

Assuming you're kidnapped by the cage bug and taken to the Slab in Silksong against your will, the following walkthrough will help you escape.

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  1. Once you've escaped the cage, go to the bottom left corner of the room and take the path out. There will be a door that requires the Indolent Key. You can't open it yet, but kick the cracked ceiling above it to open a path.
  2. Follow the tunnel around and you'll see a bunch of bugs with your gear. You can't get it yet, but that's clearly the destination.
  3. Head outside and follow the path around to a big room with a couple of enemy bugs that you'll need to kick to death or just run past to reach the hole in the floor.
  4. At the bottom you'll find Grindle in a cell on the right, but head left into a room with some enemies and the Key of Indolent. Then double back through Grindle's cell with the key.
  5. Leave into the main column and go across to find Grindle, a Bench, and in a small cavern beyond, the Slab Map. This should make things easier!
  6. Take the path and Indolent Key below the bench, and there'll be a gauntlet of enemies and spinning blades to clear. Keep in mind that if you're smart, you can trigger the blade to kill the enemies!
  7. Platform your way up this spiky room to the very top. It's tough, but I promise it's doable.
  8. On the roof of the Slab, keep running left! This area will freeze you to death if you're not standing near a fire. Use flames and lights to thaw yourself and prevent damage. You'll have to stick your head out occasionally, but as long as you're fast, you should be safe.
  9. Drop back down back into the building and make sure you use the bench on the left before proceeding.
  10. Head down to reach the hatch above those bugs with your gear. Dropping down will cause Hornet to snap the thief's neck like a badass and reclaim her weapons, but then you need to use them to fight all the other bugs off. Winning this fight will also earn you the Key of Heretic. We'll highlight the path in blue from this point to help distinguish it.
  11. Head right and through the locked door back into the central column, then use the Heretic Key to navigate the paths down to the Exit – the Bell Beast fast travel point!

From here you can either leave the Slab, explore some more of its optional areas, or see what areas it links to. Mount Fay is to the East, where you can get the Silksong double jump, but keep in mind you won't be able to complete this area until you have the Clawline harpoon power.

Apostate Key location in Silksong

(Image credit: Team Cherry)

The Slab in Silksong has a third set of locks that require the Key of Apostate, but that's not found on the path laid out above. In fact, the Key of Apostate is located in the Putrified Ducts region, all the way on the other side of the Silksong Map. I've marked it's location above, where it's simply found in the upper left corner of the room, but it'll be a long time before you can make it to this area, and you'll need all the major Silksong abilities to do so.

The Slab in Silksong

(Image credit: Team Cherry)

Once you come back with the Apostate key, you'll be able to unlock some optional areas in the Slab that you wouldn't normally be able to, such as platforming challenge that leads to a Mask Shard, and a dark tunnel that leads to an optional Boss Fight with a major foe – The First Sinner.

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Joel Franey
Joel Franey
Guides Editor, GamesRadar+

Joel Franey is a writer, journalist, podcaster and Very Tired Man with a BA from Brunel University, a Masters from Sussex University and a decade working in games journalism, often focused on guides coverage but also in reviews, features and news. His love of games is strongest when it comes to groundbreaking narratives like Disco Elysium, UnderTale and Baldur's Gate 3, as well as innovative or refined gameplay experiences like XCOM, Sifu, Arkham Asylum or Slay the Spire. He is a firm believer that the vast majority of games would be improved by adding a grappling hook, and if they already have one, they should probably add another just to be safe. You can find old work of his at Eurogamer, Gfinity, USgamer, SFX Magazine, RPS, Dicebreaker, VG247, and more.

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