Elden Ring Nightreign's first enhanced boss just dropped out of nowhere, and there's an extremely useful new NPC too

Well, that was unexpected: Elden Ring Nightreign players just discovered the first of the new "enhanced bosses" FromSoftware said were coming this month. Defeating it rewards you with a new currency you can spend on a bunch of extremely useful stuff at a new NPC.

To unlock the "Everdark Sovereign" version of Gaping Maw, you need to defeat his normal version first.

I couldn't put a team together in time to go and fight the Everdark Sovereign Gaping Maw boss, but streamer Oroboro was able to take him out alone. It looks like the lightning dragon starts in his second phase and causes a tornado to appear in the arena that you have to avoid.

Surviving the encounter will reward you with a new currency separate from Murk called Sovereign Sigils. You can go spend these at a new NPC in the Roundtable Hold who sells powerful new relics for each character as well as all the skins in the game for what is a relatively cheaper price than what they cost in Murk.

But here's where it gets even better: This new NPC also lets you pay a small sigil fee to be able to start up any of the Shifting Earth events. Previously, you had to defeat three Nightlords for these things to show up randomly, but now you have direct control over them.

The NPC also lets you pay to receive the alternative version of a relic reward from the Guardian's remembrance quests and to turn the lights (Site of Grace) back on in the Roundtable Hold's expedition room to brighten things back up.

FromSoftware has said absolutely nothing about the update, so it's unclear when we'll see the other new bosses. We'll just have to keep an eye on the list to see if it updates over the next few days.