Overview
Return to Crookback Bog is a secondary quest in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and the conclusion of the Bloody Baron’s story. It begins right after Geralt agrees to help Phillip Strenger bring back his wife Anna, following Family Matters and The Whispering Hillock. It is set in Crookback Bog in Velen and fails if not finished before The Isle of Mists.
Into the swamp
In Downwarren, which may be in ruins depending on what Geralt did at the Whispering Hillock, the ealdorman says a band of witch hunters led by a young woman has gone into the swamp. The Baron gathers his men and they head for the orphanage. Stay near him on the way. Drowners, rotfiends and a water hag attack along the path.
At the orphanage the witch hunters are already fighting. Their leader turns out to be Tamara, the Baron’s daughter, who makes her feelings about her father very clear. Then they find Anna.
What became of Anna
Anna’s state depends on the Whispering Hillock. If Geralt freed the spirit after the ealdorman gave him the task, the Crones have turned her into a grave hag as punishment for letting the orphans escape. Otherwise she is human but has lost her mind after the children were taken by the Crones. Either way, a howl warns of an attack: drowners, water hags and finally a fiend.
The endings
Anna has gone mad. The Baron decides to take her to a hermit in the Blue Mountains who might heal her. Tamara wants to go but stays with the witch hunters, and makes her father promise to care for her mother. This is the most hopeful outcome of the questline.
Anna is a grave hag. Geralt tracks down the godling Johnny, who saw the Crones take a lock of Anna’s hair into the orphanage basement. Down there, Geralt must pick one of four dolls. The one with the violet hollyhock bloom, Anna’s favorite flower, lifts the curse, but the Crones tied the curse to her life and she dies in her family’s arms. Choosing the wrong doll burns her to death. Either way the Baron, broken, returns to Crow’s Perch and hangs himself from the tree in the courtyard.
Aftermath
With the Baron gone, his sergeant takes over and his men grow even crueler toward the peasants at Crow’s Perch. Geralt can step in on two occasions near the village for a little extra XP.