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The land of Hyrule holds many secrets, most of which Link simply passes by without any context as to what they are or where they came from. The Cursed Statue riddle, on the other hand, is one of the few mysteries that Link does get to solve throughout his adventure.
But although the answer to the Cursed Statue riddle is easy enough to decipher, the question of what the Cursed Statue is, why it is guarding a Sheika Shrine, and who cursed the statue in the first place all remain unanswered.
Unfortunately, I can’t answer all of those questions as the origins of the Cursed Statue are never revealed in the game. I certainly have some theories, however, which I will delve into at the end. What I do know for sure, though, is how to complete The Cursed Statue side quest and the accompanying Kam Urog Shrine.
Key Notes Up Front
The Cursed Statue is a side quest in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. The quest is triggered when Link interacts with an NPC named Calip, who resides in a small hut near Fort Hateno. Calip gives Link a riddle that he needs to solve to uncover the Kam Urog Shrine.
The quest itself can only be completed after 9.00 pm, and players must find their way to the location and solve the riddle without any further hints from the game. Thankfully, the riddle is relatively easy to decipher.
Finding Dr. Calip and Starting the Quest
The first step to uncovering yet another of the 120 Shrines in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is triggering The Cursed Statue side quest by talking to Calip. Where you can find the researcher depends on what time of day it is.
During the day, you can find Calip studying ancient statutes in what looks like a graveyard filled with Deity figures. By 9.00 pm each night, he heads back to his hut in Fort Hateno to continue his research there.
Since the quest can only be completed at night, you might want to build a fire and wait until nighttime if you happen to find his hut first like I did. That way you can complete the quest asap, but the choice is yours. If you find the graveyard first, it makes sense to start the quest and then build a fire to wait until nighttime.
You can find Dr. Calip’s hut by heading to the Dueling Peaks Stable and following the road east. Turn right when you get to the road sign, and follow the path past the Guardians and into the Fort Hateno gate. His hut is nestled in some trees to your right.
When you meet Calip, he is excited as he thinks you have approached him as a fan of his research. When he learns this isn’t the case, he becomes dejected and tells Link to remember his name as he will eventually become famous due to all of his research on ancient shrines.
Calip insists that he is a doctor and begins to brag about his secret research which is so secret he hasn’t even told his family about it. To start with, Dr. Calip doesn’t want to Link anything about what he is studying, so you need to butter him up a little bit.
Throughout the conversation, Link will be given a dialogue choice in which you can choose one of two options. The first is to respond to his comment with “Of course, Dr. Calip” Or “Gotcha, Calip.” If you choose the first option and refer to him as a doctor, he will become flattered and let you in on his research.
This is where you learn the riddle: “When a dark light resides in the Cursed Statue’s eyes, pierce its gaze to purge the seal from the Shrine.“
Finding the Cursed Statue
If you begin the quest at Dr. Calip’s hut, you will need to find your way to the statue’s location. It is reasonably close to the hut, so if you end up in Hateno Village, you know you have gone too far and should turn back.
Leave Dr. Calip’s hut and head straight back to the road. Once you reach the path, turn right and follow along it for a couple of hundred meters. Once the road starts to bend to the right, take the small entrance to your left that you will see right on the corner. Follow the small unmarked pathway up and into the graveyard.
There is a small statue somewhere around the center of the group. After 9.00 pm at night, its eyes will glow with a mysterious purple light. All you need to do is shoot its eyes with an arrow to solve the riddle. The statue will explode, and the Kam Urog Shrine will rise near the back of the clearing.
Trial of Passage: Kam Urog Shrine Guide
Shrines are never easy and always involve some sort of puzzle or combat challenge. If you usually have trouble completing Shrines, follow this guide to learn how to complete the Kam Urog puzzle. This Shrine is like a big Stasis challenge and shouldn’t give you too much trouble.
Enter the Shrine, and run down to the bottom of the ramp. With Stasis at the ready, enter the spinning room. The room is filled with giant spiked balls, so make sure you have Stasis ready to go just in case you need to stop one from hurtling towards you when you enter.
When you’re inside the room, head to the middle and wait until you get picked up by one of the large platforms. Let the platform scoop you up and lift you until you are able to run over to the two spinning gears. Stasis the horizontal gear so you can climb on top of it. To the right, you will see a small platform with a chest on it. Head over to the platform and open the chest to get an opal.
Once you’ve collected the first chest, turn back to face the room with the gears. Depending on the current position of the room, you may or may not be able to collect the second chest straight away. You can glide straight down to the second chest if you are lucky enough. Otherwise, wait on the platform until you see the chest platform appear and Stasis one of the gears, so it stays still long enough for you to reach it.
You can skip the chest if you want since it only has a Soldier’s Spear in it. It’s not a very valuable weapon so it might not be worth the trouble.
Once you’ve collected those chests, head back to the horizontal gear by hitching a ride on one of the spinning platforms. Run onto the gear and wait until the platform on the far side of the room is accessible. Stasis the vertical gear this time so you can run onto the next platform and over to the far wall so you’re facing the vertical gear.
Once the vertical gear is in motion again, jump onto one of its teeth and let it lift you up to the next platform. Jump onto the platform and take the stairs to your left.
You will be able to see a gap in the stairs here. Wait until the spinning room brings the missing piece up to meet the other staircases. You can Stasis the stairs if you would like to make running up them easily, but you will have plenty of time just to boost it through and make it to the other side if you would prefer to do it that way.
However, you choose to do it, climb the staircase and turn right to meet the Monk, interacting with it to complete the Kam Urog Shrine.
What Do I Get for Completing the Cursed Statue Side Quest and Kam Urog Shrine?
There aren’t a lot of rewards for completing this side quest in terms of valuable items. There are two chests in the Shrine, one containing an Opal and another with a Soldier’s Spear. The Opal is the only item of real value there. What you do get, though, is one step closer to completion. You get to complete one more of the games 120 Shrines, and collect one more Spirit Orb to trade with the Goddess Statues for Stamina or Hearts.
You also get the general satisfaction of completing the riddle and figuring out the answer to Dr. Calip’s lifelong research in all of 20 minutes.
If you ever want to swap your Stamina or Hearts, you can pay a visit to the Horned Statue found just outside Hateno Village.
What is the Story Behind the Cursed Statue?
The Cursed Statue was one of my favorite side quests because it is such an enigma. It’s all very well and good solving the riddle and completing the shrine, but I felt like I still had so many questions about the statue after the quest was completed.
Like who put the statues there in the first place, and what do they signify? I also found myself wondering who cursed the statue and how it was connected to the Sheika if it was inherently cursed by some evil entity.
The best place to start would be with the location. It isn’t explicitly stated in the riddle or the Ancient Text you can find in Dr. Calip’s hut, but the location of the statue seems like a graveyard. The area is filled with statues, almost like graves, but they aren’t exactly headstones.
The deity statues themselves are seen in other places throughout Breath of the Wild, mainly as part of Korok Seed puzzles, where you give the statues offerings. There is one exactly like that in the centre of Kakariko Village, for example.
I became interested in these statues and did some research on things they could possibly represent in real life. I found they are very similar to Japanese Jinzo statues, which, when clothed, are used to pay respect to souls of children who never got to be born.
That could be why such a large collection of these statues is in an area resembling a graveyard. The Calamity took most of the lives in Hyrule, wiping out entire generations. The disaster didn’t just steal the lives of those living in Hyrule at the time, but the children that they would have gone on to have in the future.
So while this mysterious area in Fort Hateno is very similar to a graveyard, it isn’t exactly like one. It seems more like a place where survivors of the Calamity could go to pay respects to the many generations of souls that were lost during the battle.
So there is a possible explanation of how the statue got there in the first place, but that begs the question, who cursed it? The eyes of the statue glow with a purple light that usually is linked to monsters and evil seals across the land of Hyrule.
The same purple glow locks the chests in monster camps, for example, where Link has to eliminate all the monsters before the seal on the chest breaks and he can access the treasure they were guarding.
But usually, in those instances, the chest glows with a yellow light once the seal is broken. This does not happen in The Cursed Statue quest when you break the seal on the Shrine. It’s a small detail, but the difference did make me think a little more about the logistics of the supposed curse and whether it was exactly the same sort of seal.
If some evil monster or person could curse the statue that sealed the Shrine, would they not have taken over the Shrine itself? The Shrine was left entirely as it was intended for the Hero to find it. So, in the end, my final thoughts on the origin of the statue’s curse are that I don’t really think anyone cursed it at all.
Many of the Shrines in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild have challenges or puzzles you need to solve before you can gain access to the Shrine, like the Watch Out for the Flowers quest, where you have to walk through the narrow path between the flowers without damaging any of them to reach the Hila Rao Shrine.
Or The Stolen Heirloom quest, where you must complete another side quest to unlock the Lakna Rokee Shrine or even Eventide Island, which has a whole series of combat challenges before the Shrine can be accessed. There are many examples of Shrines that involve Link completing some sort of quest to gain access to them, all of which are set up by the Sheikah to test the Hero’s abilities. It’s possible that The Cursed Statue wasn’t even really cursed to begin with.
It was just yet another test created by the Sheikah, and the Ancient Text was created and left by them for the Hero to find and eventually solve. That also answers why Dr. Calip spent his entire life trying to solve such an easy riddle. Only the Hero could solve it.
FAQs
Question: How many Shrines are there in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild?
Answer: There are 120 Shrines in total.
Question: Do All of the Shrines in Breath of the Wild Require the Completion of a Side Quest to Unlock?
Answer: No, some Shrines are just hidden around the land or in plain sight. 42 Shrines require the completion of side quests beforehand.
Question: Can You Complete the Quest without Finding and Talking to Dr. Calip First?
Answer: No, you do need to speak to him to begin the quest in order to complete it.
The Cursed Statue is One of the Most Interesting Shrine Quests
The mystery of The Cursed Statue’s origins may remain officially unanswered. But with the help of this guide, at least The Cursed Statue side quest and the Kam Urog Shrine themselves are solvable for you. The Cursed Statue side quest is just one of the many mysteries and secrets Hyrule has to offer, but answers are, unfortunately, not as plentiful. Theorizing about their origins is the best we can do at this stage.
Whether you want to complete every Shrine in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild or finally tick The Cursed Statue side quest off your to-do list, hopefully, this guide was able to help you on your journey.