After a rather nasty scare, Atreus and Kratos decide they can’t wait any longer. It’s time to head to the mountain.
Travel to the mountains
The quest starts after finishing The Marked Trees . You should already have enough points to buy skills beforehand , so see what interests you the most. We would personally recommend improving your close combat with the Leviathan Axe .
Whatever you decide, there is nothing left in the area of the house , so just keep going. Drop down the crack, cross the ledge and climb the wall, following the only possible path
Once you reach the cave, before you lift Atreus up , look around the ground floor. There are two small piles of Silver you can grab. Now, help the boy up. You’ll need to turn the wheel to lower the bridge and freeze the gear with the axe . This will make the bridge stationary.
Have the boy release the chain with the square button and go up. Remember not to call back the axe to avoid unfreezing the gear or you will have to repeat the process. Don’t cross the bridge when climbing the chain, turn around and you will see that you can jump across two ledges until you reach a chest .
Then continue up the crack, drop the chain on the next ledge and continue your ascent. Once at the top, continue along the only possible path, climbing the wooden structure and through the cave. As soon as you come out there is some Silver . You will reach a forest area with several draugr that you must eliminate.
With the area cleared, let’s start exploring. You can throw your axe at a bucket hanging in the trees to collect some more money. There’s more if you follow the path to the left, and you’ll find a health recovery next to the corpse under the tree. The important part is next to the cliff you need to climb to continue. In fact, it’s impossible to miss it, because the game itself will tell you to press the square button and activate the first Lore Marker in the region. Now, go up the wall
Continue towards the mountain
As soon as you climb the crack, look to the left and grab some Silver. Be careful, because another of those ice draugr will attack you , so use your fists. Go forward a bit (there’s more Silver on one side of the clearing) and Atreus will point out a legendary chest containing the Light Rune Attack Hel’s Touch .
There will be a short tutorial explaining how this works. Basically, these are gems that you put into your weapon and activate with a certain button combination (the game will tell you which one) and allow you to use “magic” so to speak. Rune attacks can be upgraded, like skills, and only require spending XP points (at least for now). At this point, you’ll get the Good Moves trophy . Then continue forward, lifting the rock for Atreus to cross. After the sequence, you’ll have to fight a bunch of draugr .
Escape from the ruins
Pick up any items dropped by enemies after you defeat them. Before you continue, there is another Lore Marker on the side of the courtyard .
At that moment “something” will appear, a new type of draugr that is heavier and more resistant, with two life bars. Be careful because it takes much longer to stun them in order to make a direct elimination. Be very careful because they are more dangerous than they seem , they will not stay still waiting to receive blows and can try to finish off Atreus , if you see a red circle and the child complains, hit the enemy in question quickly so that he releases it.
Once you’ve eliminated them, climb up the wall from which they emerged. Go forward a little and when you see some wood piled up on your right, break it to find Silver. Before crossing the bridge, there is more on the left, in a gap. Now continue towards that… “thing”. You will encounter a new type of enemy, the apparition , which you cannot kill if you do not shoot it with Atreus to make it stay still for a couple of seconds. Even so, it will constantly teleport. Be very careful because your life bar can go down dangerously fast.
Now keep going and you will see that you have to climb, but you can go down, if you look closely . Start by doing that, going down.
Be very careful, because there is an extremely powerful draugr , although you can defeat it if you don’t attack like crazy. Just dodge, hit and repeat. Be careful because it will kill you in two hits. When you defeat it, you can break the cube hanging by the entrance to get some Silver, and open the chest to get Aegir’s Gold, Soft Svartalfheim Steel and more Silver.
Now climb back up the wall, this time all the way to the top. Before you cross the bridge , look to the right just as you climb up to see another chest. There’s some Soft Svartalfheim Steel in it. Break the cube before jumping over the bridge to get more Silver.
Be careful, as you jump over the bridge you will be attacked by a draugr. If you look to the right as soon as you jump, you will see a raised bridge. Break the two disks by throwing the axe to lower it. For now, don’t go in that direction, even if you see a chest with runes at the end.
Instead, go left. You’ll encounter several enemies, and once you eliminate them you’ll find two things: the Sealed Svartalfheim Scroll (it’s a glowing object on the ground, impossible to miss) and, behind the wooden doors at the back, the Shrine of Hrungnir
Climb up the ledge between the Scroll and the Shrine and you’ll find a chest. Now, head over to the chest with glowing runes we left behind. You can click here to learn how to open the first Norn chest in the River Pass region .
Now go forward across the bridge. As soon as you jump over the gap, look to the right and you will see a chest. Now go forward and you will find another frozen draugr to defeat. Be very careful because many other enemies will also attack you as soon as you defeat it.
With all enemies out of the way, activate the wheel next to the bridge to lower it. You should not turn the wheel all the way , you will see that just below, on the other side, a chain rises. You should turn the wheel only enough so that the disc is right in the gap in the grating and throw the axe to break the mechanism and be able to jump .
Just after crossing the bridge you will see a chest on the right with Soft Svartalfheim Steel. Continue forward and raise the gate so Atreus can cross.
Defeat the thieves
You will be attacked by several humans , who do not represent the slightest threat. They are neither fast, nor strong, nor resistant. After the sequence you will have to face a pair of ice draugr, still without Atreus.
Escape from the ruins
We recover the main objective, break all the objects to get Silver and some life if you need it and lift Atreus up one of the wooden planks .
Once you’re up there, you’ll have to talk to the kid a couple of times (by pressing the square button with him on camera) to get him to move forward and release the chain. Continue along the only possible path, along a ledge.
Continue towards the mountain
As soon as you exit the tunnel, you’ll change target and find yourself in a frozen area. Look to your right and you’ll see a chest with Soft Svartalfheim Steel . Now, go down the chain . Follow the path along the only possible path and you’ll find the first Find of the region.
Also, right along the way you’ll find an Odin’s Raven , which you can kill with an axe blow.
Continue forward to see a cutscene. You will have to throw the axe at the tree with the orange leaves on the right as you cross the bridge in order to continue.
At this point you’ll be taken to the weapon upgrade tutorial , and you’ll be required to upgrade the Leviathan Axe to level 2. You’ll also be able to craft armor if you’ve followed the guide and collected enough money and materials. As soon as you exit the menu you’ll have to fight a couple of enemies to test out your upgraded weapon. If you craft a piece of armor and then upgrade it, you’ll get the Dwarven Ingenuity trophy . You can also sell your collectibles (don’t worry, it won’t negatively affect you.
Before moving forward, look to the right of the blacksmith . In the clearing there is a small slope that you can drop down to collect another Find .
To the left of the dwarf you will see a bridge with a disk that you can break. Do it and let yourself fall, you will reach a chest and a chain that you will go down, of course. There is a chest with Soft Svartalhfeim Steel . If you want, go forward a little and lift the grate, but it is just a shortcut. Go back up.
This time, approach the chained gate near the dwarf. The mechanism is the same as always, use the chain and freeze the disc with the axe to cross. When you reach the spiked wall, throw the axe at the top right corner and it will open like a door. Hit the second one three times to open a passage to a chest with Soft Svartalfheim Steel .
To get through this room, you must hit the glowing plank of the mechanism a couple of times, until you see that it stops spinning, and quickly throw the axe at the disk to freeze it. When you cross you will be attacked by several draugr, do not press the triangle button to retrieve the axe : you have it freezing the mechanism, if you call it back, it will unfreeze and you don’t need to be Captain Obvious to predict that you will be crushed by the spiked ceiling. You will have to use only your fists.
With everyone dead, look at the back of the room: there is another spiked gate and another mechanism to raise the roof. You have to hit the spiked gate to make it open and alternate with the mechanism, until Atreus crosses, and then sneak into the gap with him.
However, once you are safe and the ceiling has come down, do not proceed any further . If you noticed, while fighting the enemies, you will have seen another one of those chests with runes. If you click here you can see how to open the second Norn chest in the River Pass region .
Now move forward. Before continuing, as soon as you leave the spiked roof to move forward, next to the corpse there is another Find .
Help Atreus climb up the ledge to see a cutscene. Go down the only possible path and interact with the altar when the boy tells you to . Climb up the ledges to the left and activate the crank to make the rings spin. If you look closely, you’ll see gears in the holes on the disk . The idea is to freeze any one by throwing the axe, wait for it to align with the section it’s stuck to, then bring the axe back to unfreeze it, keep it spinning (now well placed) and repeat with the next section. The pattern they should form is this:
Once you have placed it, interact with them. Now go through the cave. You will hear some crows cawing, you will see them as soon as you exit the tunnel, on the left. You are not interested in them, but if you go up to where they are, you will find another Find .
Then follow Atreus through the cave. On the ceiling of the next section is a bucket with some Silver. Go a little further to see a short cutscene.
Hunting with Atreus
As soon as you leave the cave you will encounter a troll . It behaves like the previous one, but this time it has a disadvantage: you can stun it to press R3 . You won’t kill it in one hit, but you will get on its head and do a lot of damage.
Keep in mind that during combat there will be a lot of minor enemies firing poison projectiles, which can put you in serious trouble. Ideally, you should throw the axe at them as soon as you have them in range, to eliminate them and then avoid being caught by the troll’s fire attacks.
Once you’ve eliminated it, pick up the items it drops, including the Ivaldi Anvil , a Heavy Rune Attack. With the bugs eliminated, let’s explore .
- In the center of the lake, if you look up, you will see an Odin’s Raven perched on one of those curved tree or bone species.
- With the point from which you entered the area behind you, move forward and on the right you will see a ledge to climb up to a chest with Silver.
- Continue along the area to the right, you will go up a stream to a corpse with Silver.
Follow the edge of the map (past the cave) and you’ll come to another sealed chest. Click here to open the third Norn chest in the River Pass region . You’ll be able to clearly see two of the three runes, one on top of the chest and one just across the river.
Look to the left with the Norns’ Chest in front of you and you’ll see a wall of planks. Throw your axe at the top and you’ll be able to pull Atreus up and have him drop a chain. Once up there, you’ll find a monolith to interact with – this is another Lore Marker .
There’s nothing else to do here, enter the cave and grab the items next to the corpse. When you exit the cave there will be a short cutscene. Don’t worry, it can’t go right no matter what you do. As soon as you get down to the village, turn around, go around the wooden structure and hit the side . Hidden inside is a chest. On the next roof, pecking at a corpse, is another Odin’s Raven .
Break the planks in the “door” of the building on the same roof where the crow was to find some Silver. There is another house that is also boarded up and also has Silver inside. As you start to climb the hill, leaving the village, look to the left and you will see a ledge to climb up on, there is a chest.
Go up a little further and you will be attacked by an ice draugr , which you must obviously kill. Inside the house where it came from, there is, of course, Silver. Now follow the boy and move the column.
Find Atreus
You will have to move forward a little and you will enter a small maze. Don’t get lost!
- With the entrance behind you, at the first intersection turn right.
- At the next intersection (you will see fire on the ground, to your right), turn left.
- Continue straight ahead, crossing over a log, until you find another torch next to some boxes, the next crossroads. Go to the right and you will reach a cave.
- When you exit the cave, go left. When you jump over the tree, there will be a small (and slightly distressing) cutscene.
Follow the witch
Go after the new character. You can only go in one direction, so just walk.
Pick up the white-petaled flower and return to Atreus.
Simply go out the door and head left. You’ll soon see the white flowers . Pick them up and head to the other end of the garden to talk to Atreus and watch a cutscene.
Return to the witch
There is nothing to do in this section: you can’t explore, you can’t break things, you can’t kill anything… go back to the cabin. At this point you will get the trophy A New Friend .
Go to the boat
From now on, you have an objective marker at the top of the interface . Pretty useful if you want to explore before going for the main objective, right? Go a little further and you’ll be attacked by nightmares, some rather weak floating eyes that won’t give you too many headaches.
Before moving forward, if you look to the left you will see a wall with “something” bright red and to its left a kind of passageway, go through there, take the Silver next to the corpse and go down.
As soon as you go down, look to the right and you’ll see a huge stone block . Push it into the water (in the gap where the block was there’s a chest with Soft Svartalfheim Steel) and you’ll be able to jump to a platform where there’s another one . Follow the path along the only possible path and you’ll find the first Find . You might see a red chest and a Norn Chest from here, yes, that’s true. But you can’t reach them yet, go back up to the part where you fought the nightmares.
Jump across the platform to the legendary chest in the background, open it to get a Talisman of Concentrated Vitality . Simply open the menu and you can equip it.
At this point in the game, you can’t do anything else with those strange eyes, which obviously serve a purpose, or with the red pulsating object on the wall. So just get on the boat to continue to the next part of the story.
Sail into the light of day
You don’t have to be Captain Obvious to know what to do. Just go straight ahead. No, you can’t use the boat to get to another place in the previous area, you can only go towards the objective.
Investigate the glowing statue
You probably already have an idea of what’s coming. When you’re in the suspiciously closed “open” sea area, you’ll eventually see a light on the objective marker – get close to it. Stand in front of the chest so Atreus can read the runes.
Dock at the pier
This area is HUGE , it interconnects several areas and in many you still can’t properly explore. So we recommend you go directly to the objective to save yourself problems and unnecessary turns.
Investigate the temple and the bridge
Go up the stairs and you’ll see a cutscene. Go ahead and talk to Brok, from now on you’ll be able to fast-track to the shop… and nothing else, because you have no more access unlocked. Although you’re sure to remember having seen some of these formations at other points.
Get to the tower
Exit the shop and go down the stairs on your left . At the bottom of the stairs you’ll find a dead soldier and a Figurehead , a Finds set scattered across multiple areas.
This is a type of collectible that corresponds to the Nine Shores region and for the moment we are not going to look for more, due to the issue we have just discussed: you lack the means to interact with everything and it would be a silly thing to do.
Continue towards the objective (don’t interact with the lever on your way, you can’t do anything up there) until you fight some enemies. Afterwards you’ll reach the tower door , but first, let’s do one thing.
To the left of the door you will see a chest and a lever, which will lower an elevator. There is a corpse with Silver. Repeat the process to the right of the door, in this case you will find a chain that will take you to a new area, the Watchtower . Blow up the jar and go down to the shore. The exact place where you are is this:
You’ll see a Norn Chest, but you won’t be able to open it for now. You will, however, see a corpse surrounded by spikes . What you need to do now is throw the axe at the spinning mechanism just above the corpse, the spikes will be removed and you’ll be able to grab another Find .
On the same islet, you can also see the Treasure Map: The Hunter’s Kingdom on the ground . There’s nothing else to do here (you can’t interact with anything at the moment) so go back to the tower door and this time cross.
Go through the tower and the caves
As soon as you enter you will have to defeat several poisonous dragur . Then, look at the room you are in: break the timbers on the left and you will find the Jörmungandr Shrine .
Now go forward along the only possible path, you have to throw the axe at that “torch” to freeze it and stop the flow of poison. When you reach the caves and repeat, a new enemy will appear, a kind of small snake, nothing to worry about. As soon as you kill it, look to your left , there is a chest with a Muspelheim Key . Atreus cannot read the stone nearby, so climb the tower. You will soon reach another new region.
As soon as you finish the sequence, defeat the enemies and look to the right from the door you just went through. You’ll see another one of those “poison torches” , freeze it and go around the rock to find the first legendary chest in the region.
As soon as you grab the chest, turn around and in the distance you will see another cloud of smoke , covering some kind of mechanism.
Climb up along the right side of the path and you will reach a sealed chest, this chest was opened precisely by turning these mechanisms that you have seen while you were going up. You will see the last one just behind the chest, simply turn the blades until it opens. If you want to know more, click here to see how to open the chest of the Norns of Laderas .
Now continue moving forward in a straight line along the ledge and at the bottom you will see a crack to climb (before climbing, look to the left and you will see a chest).
When you go up you will see that to advance you will have to throw the axe to freeze toxic clouds . After the first one you will reach a crossroads, go straight and you will find a chest with the Arcane Bracers .
Proceed towards the objective and after freezing the poison in the forest you reach, you will face an apparition . You can then explore to the right if you want, but there is nothing and you cannot open any doors there, so go left through the cave.
Once you reach the top, you’ll need to take out a couple of wolves and a draugr. Then, look to your left . You’ll see a toxic cloud, a pile of rocks, and two explosive jars. Blow them both up with your axe. You’ll see a chest with Arcane Shoulder Bandages . To put out the poison torches, throw your axe at an explosive jar behind the one on the left. It will break, and you’ll be able to freeze the one on the right. Inside the chest, you’ll find the White Bear’s Charge Light Rune Attack .
Now enter the temple and you’ll see a cutscene. You’ll have to face an ogre and a bunch of stinking draugr. The ogre is extremely tough, so he can put you in serious trouble if you’re distracted. There aren’t really any big recommendations to make, you’ll just have to stick with his blocking and counterattacking moves. When you do enough damage you can get on top of him and execute him.
When you take him out, make sure you pick up the Frost Flame he drops , which is needed to upgrade the axe. He also drops some minor materials. Finally, go through the doors to reach the Base of the Mountain .
Proceed along the only possible path (you can’t do anything in this area for now) until you see a short cutscene. We will have finally completed this very long section. Here begins A Realm Beyond .