Silksong Hunter's Journal Guide: Location & Map, Rewards, Requirements and More!

What to know

• The Hunter’s Journal is obtained mid-game after a specific quest with The Chronicler.
• It contains 234 entries, covering enemies, bosses, and rare variants.
• Completion requires defeating enemies multiple times and discovering hidden foes.
• Filling it grants lore expansions, cosmetic rewards, and achievements.

The Hunter’s Journal in Hollow Knight: Silksong is your record of every creature you encounter in Pharloom. It serves as both a gameplay tracker and a lore archive, rewarding thorough exploration and combat mastery. Here’s a complete breakdown of how to get it, how it works, and why it matters.

Location of the Hunter’s Journal

Getting the Hunter’s Journal isn’t automatic—you need to complete a short questline for the Bugs of Pharloom wish:

1. Reach Greymoor: Progress the story until you enter Greymoor, a mid-game region filled with hostile constructs and deep caverns.
2. Find Nuu: Locate the cloaked NPC hidden in a side chamber near a bench. Nuu is the keeper of records. You meet Nuu after Creige.
3. Meet prerequisites: Defeat at least 20 unique enemy types (and 100 enemies) before speaking to him. This proves your combat experience.
4. Undertake his trial: Survive a short gauntlet encounter he conjures, facing off against waves of enemies.
5. Receive the journal: Once you succeed, he grants you the Hunter’s Journal, unlocking the bestiary for all future encounters.

This step-by-step path ensures you’re already familiar with Pharloom’s dangers before you begin cataloging them.

Rewards and why they matter

Filling the journal isn't just for completionists—it delivers tangible benefits that enhance your playthrough.

• Immediate unlock: Gaining the journal itself opens up lore depth, helping you understand enemy patterns and Pharloom's ecosystem, which makes combat feel more intuitive.
• Quest completion prize: For defeating 100 unique enemies, Nuu grants a Tool Pouch expansion, increasing your inventory slots for tools, crests, and silk upgrades.
• Broader implications: This extra space lets you carry more utility items without frequent backtracking, freeing you to tackle longer expeditions or tougher bosses with better preparation. It's especially handy in Silksong's faster-paced action, where Hornet's mobility shines but resource management can trip you up.

The 234 entries of the Hunter's Journal

The Hunter’s Journal in Silksong contains 234 entries, making it larger and more diverse than the original Hollow Knight version. These entries cover:

• Common enemies across all regions (the majority of entries).
• Bosses and minibosses, each with extended lore notes.
• Rare variants that only spawn in specific conditions.
• Quest-tied creatures, which may only appear once per playthrough.

Each entry isn’t filled instantly—you often need to defeat a creature multiple times for the description to expand. This system rewards persistence and ensures players engage with all enemy types rather than skipping them. The 234 total also means that completing the journal requires exploring every region thoroughly, making it a natural guide to 100% completion.

Here’s a breakdown of the milestones you’ll hit as you progress through the journal:

These rewards encourage steady progress, while the lore expansions at 25% and 50% make reading entries meaningful rather than purely mechanical.

Changes to the map, crest, inventory, and materium

After you unlock the Hunter’s Journal, subtle but important updates appear across your interface and progression systems:

• Map updates: New icons appear on your region maps marking where certain yet-to-be-recorded enemies are commonly found. This doesn’t give exact spawns but highlights areas worth revisiting for missing entries.
• Crest changes: Hornet’s crest gains a faint etched border once the journal is unlocked, which becomes more ornate as you hit the 50% and 100% completion milestones. It visually represents your growing mastery of Pharloom’s fauna.
• Inventory additions: A dedicated tab for the Hunter’s Journal is added in your inventory menu. Here you can track progress by category (Beasts, Constructs, Fungal, etc.), making it easier to know what you’re missing.
• Materium connection: Certain rare enemies drop extra materium fragments once their entry is fully recorded. This gives you tangible crafting and upgrade benefits for completing the journal beyond cosmetic rewards.

Together, these changes make the journal feel integrated into your adventure rather than just a side feature, encouraging you to explore deeper and keep refining your combat knowledge.

How the journal fits into Silksong’s lore

The Hunter’s Journal isn’t just a checklist—it fits deeply into the world of Silksong. By working with The Chronicler, you become part of Pharloom’s tradition of recording its shifting, dangerous ecology. Each entry gives insights into how enemies live, what drives them, and how they connect to the kingdom’s history.

Having the journal enriches your journey: it makes exploration more purposeful, deepens your understanding of the story, and rewards you for uncovering secrets you might otherwise miss. For completionists and lore-seekers alike, it’s an essential companion that transforms combat encounters into pieces of a much larger narrative puzzle.