Nabbing the Sword Of The Serpent achievement (and overcoming the memory of your insane father’s hateful ranting) requires that you switch back and forth between two different areas instead of fully completing either of them.

If you finish the tasks in the landscape world, you won’t have the ability to head back and grab this achievement later.

Going To The Land Of Fables

After turning on the flashlight and leaving the foyer through the glass doors, take the first left into the main panting room where an indistinct sheet of paper is sitting on the dresser (to the right of the stack of rolled up papers and the knocked over coat rack).

Choosing The Crayon

Taking a peek at the hazy paper transports you to a different version of the room where you have to choose between a crayon (which takes you to child’s painting universe) or a paint brush (which takes you to the world of the realistic landscape).

Grab the crayon and interact with the painting to go into the land of fables where everything is drawn like a children’s cartoon. Go forward from the easel and pull the red lever sitting on the ground. The lever turns on the lamps that reveal a path further into the land of fables.

Pulling The Lever

Follow the red path and the flickering lights forward until you see the danger sign with the symbol of the snake. Right after the sign, you should see “Let Me Out” scrawled on the floor. Grab the yellow crayon sitting on the ground near the letters.

Follow the path back to the easel and interact with the painting while you have the yellow crayon in your inventory. The painting will change from a broken snake to a doodle of clouds (and get a round of angry ranting from your father, who thinks crayons are beneath his child).

The Yellow Crayon

To the left of the easel (by a sign with a bunch of directions) you’ll notice a wood sword in a stone – but much like the legend you can’t yet pull it free. Instead, grab the paint brush on the stand to the right of the easel and interact with the painting to be transported to the other world.

Sword In The Stone

In this world, the painter is angry about your youthful green tree paintings and wants something wiser and less childish. Turn left from the painting and go through the crack in the wall next to the chair.

Turn left again at the wall and grab the red paint sitting on the bookshelf facing the wall. If you do any exploring, ignore the green, blue, and white paint laying around as using these will just make the painter angry.

Red Paint

Head back to the painting and interact with it to switch the landscape to an autumn setting. Now the painter wants you to make the setting darker, which means you need black paint. The layout of the room has completely changed, so ignore everything you did earlier. Turn left and go by the table with the broken vase and into the covered hallway.

Finding The Hallway

Ignore the white paint on the right side and keep following the hallway as it turns different directions. When you reach the dead end with the painting, turn around to see a bookcase covered in brushes chasing after you. Turn back around to discover the dead end has disappeared.

Push the large basketball up the slanted pile of toys until it falls into place and makes a bridge giving access to the black paint. Grab the paint and wait for the area to change yet again.

Crossing The Chasm To The Black Paint

Use the black paint on the painting to change the season again, then go forward and look at the chair where the crayon is sitting. Grab the drawing on the floor showing a girl carrying a sword and then pick up the crayon.

Do not do anything else in this area or grab any other paint. Interact with the painting while holding the crayon to switch worlds again now that you’ve got the sword drawing.

 The Sword Drawing

Head back to the sword in the stone and slowly lift it up (this part is a bit wonky – you have to hold the mouse button down and then lift your mouse up slowly and repeatedly about 10 times before it actually reaches the top and then disappears when you let go).

Now all you have to do is walk into the serpent as he criss-crosses the area and he’ll automatically die, unlocking the Sword Of The Serpent achievement.

One Dead Serpent

Stay tuned for more Layers Of Fear: Inheritance guides as we cover unlocking the other secret achievements and earning the DLC’s different endings.