Blade of Darkness

This achievement may sound daunting, and even after your first playthrough it may seem impossible but 8 hours gives a LOT of room for error, especially once you realise you don't have to stop and fight every enemy, some levels you can run past basically every enemy and only fight a boss at the end and with how the weapons work you won't even feel underpowered. Obviously you want to try this after playing through a few times, learn the levels and how to attack different enemies, and more importantly, how to get past and avoid traps, for me it was my 4th playthrough and only my 2nd Good Ending playthrough, I could have definitely done with practicing the Abyss a bit more because I died a few times to collapsing floor but ultimately I knew there was gonna be a lot of spare time at the end so I wasn't too worried. Anyways.. On with the guide..

Rules for the run:

This has to be done in 1 run without saving, you can pause all you want but the timer will likely keep going. If you close the game or it crashes, since you didn't save you've lost your run and need to start again anyway. I saved this as my last achievement and deleted my cloud data beforehand so I wouldn't accidentally load an old save after dying, it also makes sure the game knows I haven't used any saves, I'd recommend doing this, just in case..
Dying is allowed, die all you want, you can restart the level you're on any number of times and your run will stay intact. Well, don't die too much though because it
Needs to be completed in 8 hours, which is a very generous time with plenty of room for error.
Has to be completed with the Good Ending, I'll explain this below.

Good Ending *spoilers* (duh)

For this achievement you need to complete the good ending of the game, this means collecting all 6 Runes, empowering the sword then completing the Tower of Dal Gurak, once you do this you'll go to the Abyss and defeat the evil once and for all.

The runes are the only missable part of this but once you complete the Temple of Ianna you get the chance to go back to levels and collect them again, if going back there will be no normal enemies and instead you'll have vampires/demons chasing you (just run past them no problem) and then a fight with a Chaos Warrior before the rune location. Skip any runes you're not sure about and come back to them later, it's better spend a few minutes coming back later than possibly ruining your entire level with a silly trap death.

Just remember if you go back and collect runes at the end you need to go back to the Temple of Ianna to empower your sword again. Not 100% sure if this is needed but I wasn't going to test it lol.

Classes

So for this guide we're using the Amazon, she is the fastest character, has the best dodge, best reach on weapons, arguably does the most damage and has some of the easiest combos for attacks, the only real downside is she lacks any decent blunt weapons but that's not too bad when your slashing weapon combos can still 1-2 hit enemies with high slash resist. The Amazon also has lower health and can only acquire light armor, but both of these things are negligible once you get past the early game levels.

The Knight is also a decent choice but his lack of a dodge roll, longer starting mission, and lower reach on weapons make him a lot harder to play. His positives however are he starts with good health, has a good selection of slashing and blunt weapons and he can acquire heavy armor. The armor is nice to have but ultimately its no where near enough to compete with Amazons speed. Still a good option if you don't like the Amazon playstyle though.

Barbarian/Dwarf, Not much to say on these, the barbarians combos always felt too risky and the dwarf has very little range on his attacks, so much so he feels buggy so yeah, just stay away from these and I won't mention them any more in this guide.

Weapons

I'll mention specific weapons below as info for each of the levels too but as a quick overview, each class has 2 weapon types in which they're more efficient at using (faster swing speed, maybe more damage not sure), you can only use combos for the weapons tied to your class too, as the Amazon we'll be using 2-handed polearms/spears, the Knight uses one handed swords and maces. You can use weapons at any level as long as you have enough stamina to swing them and you unlock their combos at specific levels. You can also throw weapons to damage enemies regardless of their stamina requirements, we use this as an Amazon very early on to cheese our way through some otherwise tricky fights.

The Run

So I'm not going to go into each level in too much detail, instead I'll be letting you know of things to look out for like weapons, armor, health drops, traps, runes or other general tips, I'll also reference my video with [timestamps] for this as it makes it a lot easier to explain certain things, the video can be found at the bottom of this guide.

Each class has their own starting level, for this guide I'll only be going through the Amazon's starting level. I'll explain the starting level in a bit more detail than the other levels though.

Amazon - [0:12]
As the Amazon we start in a kind of aztec jungle area with large pyramids and a TON of traps, thankfully this level has a huge, easy to pull off skip which we'll be using and we won't come across any insta-kill traps this way. We'll also pick up a very strong weapon which we can't swing, but we can throw it for a ton of damage.
Start off running up the closest pyramids stairs across a bridge and to the right on the wall you'll find a very powerful early game weapon, the Ninjato, sadly it's a sword and you can't swing it yet, but you can throw it, so throw it at the enemy to the left and watch him fall over, pick your sword back up and the health potion that enemy might have dropped, then we're gonna climb the wall on the corner to the left of where the Ninjato was (this is where I'll stress how much easier it is to watch the video lol), climb up the wall and run around to the outside where you'll be able to jump into a conveniently placed hole above the entrance of one of the buildings, once inside the enemies aren't activated yet thanks to the skip so go ahead and kill the 2 enemies in the side rooms here to reach level 2 then go further in and jump on the table with the Temple Key to avoid the arrow traps pointing to the table. Grab the key, break the chest to your left for a health potion then exit here and take the left path around the building and underground, stay on the left until you get to the Temple Door, go inside and be ready to fight the first boss, a demon, this boss is a huge pain in the ass this early on, but essentially you want to bait his melee attack, throw your sword, avoid attacks until you can pick up your sword again then repeat, if it has about 5 health left and you want to risk it you can try to finish it off with your Bo, this is a tricky fight and I failed it a lot of times, but if you die just restart your run since it's the first level and there's no point just adding time to your run.

-- From here I'm assuming you've played the game before and know the routes through the levels--

Fortress of Tell Halaf - [4:06]
This is a perfect example of a long level being made super short by simply running past enemies, you actually don't have to fight anything, so we won't, we will however pick up the Naginata found upstairs in the second building near the start. There's a rune at the end of this level but we're skipping it for now as there's a very high chance of death in there.

Mines of Kelbegen - [12:10]
And this is just a long level, 3 gems to pick up, which one I go for first depends on how much health I have when I get there since the red path has a health potion on one of the ledges, if I need to heal I'll go red first, If not green first because its the riskiest path, there's also a rune on the green path which we will pick up along with a full health potion on the outside of the arena with the rune. Not much else to say about this, there's a few enemies you have to kill for keys here, just repeatedly throw your Ninjato at them and take your time, same with the troll at the end.

Tombs of Ephyra - [29:08]
About half way through this level shortly after picking up the graveyard key you'll drop down a hole to find a potion of power and a bunch of level 10 armored zombies spawning, kill these as they will boost your level significantly, they spawn in 3 areas just go round killing them all and you should end up around level 8 or 9, hopefully 9 because then we can use the Naginata special attack which does good enough damage to be useful until the very late game! There's also a rune after the burning skeleton, I skipped this one due to having no bow but it's easy enough to do, just avoid the swinging ball. Not much else here, be careful of the opening floor trap on your way to the golem.

Island of Karum - [40:32]
Not much here, there's a Death Bo in the center room that opens up after killing the 3 zombies, I didn't find it too useful though, there's also the first vampire fight which can be a pain, I don't have much of a strategy for these just break it's shield then try combo in from a distance, in the video I was struggling so I used my potion of power and then managed cut it down with ease.

The Oasis of Nejeb - [54:58]
It's a pretty straight forward level with another vampire fight at the end. There's a Blade's Axe on the bridge around two thirds into the level if you want to try that out, again I didn't find it too useful though. There's also a rune after the bridge that you need a bow for, you can kill the skeletons around this room for the bow if you don't have one already and there's a full quiver in the rune room, just make sure to pick it up before standing on the platform.

Temple of Al Farum - [1:09:29]
Another rune on this level, I do it first because there's a few easy ways to die on the way there, the golem in this area is optional but I choose to kill it for XP, not much else to say here, be careful on the golems at the end!

Forge of Xshathra - [1:31:16]
This is the first truly difficult level in my opinion, with tons of minotaurs, traps and cheap deaths it would be easy to spend an hour+ on this level. The minotaurs can take a while to kill but the naginata is fast enough to use your special and move back to avoid taking damage, just keep doing this and whittle them down. After the first Minotaur be sure to pick up the Heavy Naginata in the small room in the back of the arena. Skip the 2nd Minotaur unless you want to level up to heal for the next fight which is two more minotaurs, before that though you have to jump across some floating lava rocks, I find it best to just jump to the last one here and immediately jump up onto the ledge, super easy to die here though so take your time to line it up perfect before jumping. The fight with the two minotaurs can be a pain, they don't hit as hard as usual minotaurs but it is a lot easier to get hit so again just take your time, let them hit each other as much as you can but make sure you get the finishing blow for the XP. Once you get past these two just fight your way through to the end of the level.

Shalatuwar Fortress - [1:48:45]
The Amazon's Light Armor can be found early in this level, definitely worth picking up, after the little arena part go up to where the Orc leader was for a potion of power, nothing else here just run through and be careful of the orc's with the barbarian shields.

Fortress of Nemrut - [2:01:14]
Another rune on this level, once you get into the palace and go up the stairs turn around to find a switch up on the wall, for the rune itself first press the button then throw an item into the traps, after the traps triggered run to the door turn around and shoot the button again to open the door, do the same going back if needed. You can find another Blade's Axe in the window your right when you start going across the bridge in case you never tried the earlier one, again I didn't find it too useful and we'll soon be using the Heavy Naginata anyways. The rest of the level is pretty straight forward.

The Gorge of Orlok - [2:19:14]
Super short level, nothing to say here just rush through it. I grab a quick health potion on my way through the snowy area at the start.

The Temple of Ianna - [2:23:52]
Again not much to say here, just make your way through the level, try to get a bit of XP if you can, you should be level 18 and using the Heavy Naginata special by now, does a ton of damage but can be a long combo, I often found myself just using the first 2 inputs for the yellow version, does good damage still and is fast enough to avoid getting hit.

Backtracking for Runes - [2:35:19]
If you missed any runes in your playthrough now is the time to go back and get them, basically you'll load into a modified version of each level, run to the rune location, fight a chaos warrior then navigate the traps, grab the rune then leave through a teleporter. Once you have them all go back to the Temple of Ianna and you'll empower the sword allowing you to go to the Abyss after this next level.

Tower of Dal Gurak - [2:49:14]
Another difficult level but made much easier by our empowered sword, basically you can throw it endlessly for decent damage and it will teleport back to you, you can play most of this level safely this way it just takes a bit of patience. Anyway make your way out of the start of the level and head up and down the right path, you'll come to an annoying area with some rocks floating in some green acid, take your time jumping across here it's super easy to miss or fall through the rocks and die. Run past these two enemies and to the first enemy outside, this enemy drops the Armory key which is extremely useful, definitely get that key. Keep going through the level until you take the platform up to a higher floor. Don't go up the stairs yet, instead head past them and jump around to the Armory, here you'll find the Broad Spear which is hands down the strongest weapon in the game, hopefully you're close to level 19 for the special attack. Anyways just continue through the level until the boss. There's 4 500 hp potions scattered around before the boss room so grab these and heal up if needed. For the fire breathing demon boss just kite attacks until it does the stationary fire breath attack, run in and use your Broad Spear special and repeat until it dies, it should only take 2 specials assuming you connect the hits. Head up to the next arena and carefully use your sword throw to take out the skeletons, only aim for the closest one while they're attacking so they can't block and damage you. Now for Dal Gurak, pretty simple, use your sword throw in the first phase he will teleport and throw ranged attacks at you which are very easy to avoid or block on the walls, once you damage his shield enough he will stop teleporting and attack you normally, just move around to avoid his attacks and use your Broad Spear special to chunk his health down, run away to heal if needed, there's no point dying now. Not the best explanation of mechanics if I'm honest but it gets the job done.

The Abyss - [3:25:04]
So I died quite a bit at the start of my Abyss run, I'd only done it once before and didn't remember where all the collapsing floor was so it was a bit of trial and error, once you get past those parts though it's quite straight forward if not long winded path to the final boss, take the fights slowly using the sword throw and preserve health/potions as much as you can, you'll fight a bit of everything including more chaos warriors and another big demon. Once you get to the final boss the strategy is simple, find him, pop a potion of power, dodge his melee attack then start spamming your Broad Spear special, hide behind the pillars if he starts doing his laser or fire ball attacks, avoid the raining meteor attacks too but generally nothing hard here just dodge melee, special and repeat until dead.

Assuming you did it without saving and in under 8 hours the achievement should pop during the final cutscene, congrats!

My Playthrough

As mentioned throughout this guide here is my full run, overall it took me just under 3 hours 50 minutes and this was my first full Amazon playthrough, lots of room for improvement too.