Shadow of the Erdtree adds so much to Elden Ring – and so much is totally optional. Only a handful of bosses are required to reach the end and you’ll miss so much if you stay on the main progression path. The best content in the Realm of Shadow is secret, totally hidden and completely optional – you don’t need to explore terrifying forests, haunted mansions, underground gauntlets or lost ruins but they’re all worth checking out. To help you navigate the expansion, we’re going to list 10 areas that are surprisingly easy to miss. These are the biggest secret spots you’ll struggle to find, and we’ll start with one of the biggest secrets on the entire map.
#10. Ruins of Unte
The Ruins of Unte are a small, totally optional ruin found in the canyons far below Shadow Keep – and they’re one of the strangest secret spots in the game for a very simple reason. While the area itself isn’t the most impressive, actually reaching it is incredibly cryptic. You’ll have to perform a trick that doesn’t work anywhere else in the entire game, and it’s worth it if you’re looking for some of the rarest items in the Realm of Shadow.
To access the Ruins of Unte, you’ll need to progress to the Shadow Keep. This area is north of Castle Ensis, one of the first castles you’ll encounter, and is required to progress. You can’t miss the giant black tower in the northern edge of the map – and entering you’ll encounter the Gold Hippopotamus boss. Defeating the boss unlocks the Main Gate Plaza Site of Grace. Go through the shortcut door on the right and up to the walkways with the burning boats. To the right of the path leading to the Specimen Storehouse, there’s a ladder on the side of the wall. Climb down and follow a watery path to a hidden painting room. It doesn’t look like there’s anything here, but attack the blank wall on the right to reveal a hidden passage behind an illusory wall.
Progress through the sewer and you’ll encounter a coffin. Ride the coffin down to reach the Castle Watering Hole Site of Grace and an entirely new area to explore. There’s so much to visit down the river, including the Village of the Flies, but let’s stay focused on the Ruins of Unte. The ruins are a fortress straight ahead in the drainage canyon – there’s a giant Furnace Golem blocking the entrance. If you want to visit the ruins, you’ll need to get that Furnace Golem moving.
And yes, there’s a way to do that. Before we can activate the Furnace Golem, we’ll need to craft a Hefty Furnace Pot throwable item. To make it, you’ll need to collect a recipe book from the Run-Down Traveller’s Rest shack, which is located directly beneath the great bridge leading to Castle Ensis. Ride down the hill to the left of the bridge from the Gravesite Plains and you’ll find the little empty shack with this cookbook.
After crafting a Hefty Furnace Pot, climb onto the ruined building with a view of the giant Furnace Golem’s bowl-shaped head. Throw the pot into the golem and you’ll revive it – causing it to smash the rubble blocking your way inside the Ruins of Unte. Sprint inside and you can claim two useful treasures. Inside the shrine you’ll find the Giant Golden Arc spell and in the tall chair, you’ll find the Stone-Sheathed Sword. The sword is a super heavy sword trapped in its own stone sheathe, turning it into more of a massive hammer than a sword. This is just one of several secret locations where you can find this sword, but this is easily the most significant – and the river leads to so many more secrets. We’ll talk about those later in the guide. Now, let’s return to the Shadow Keep for a precarious sub-area that’s worth checking out.
#9. Specimen Storehouse Loft
After defeating the Golden Hippopotamus boss, you’ll be able to access the greater part of the Shadow Keep. Messmer’s spooky forest gets especially complicated once you leave the ramparts and enter the interior Specimen Storehouse. This is a creepy area that’s very tonally similar to locations in previous Souls games – like the Duke’s Archives in Dark Souls, you’ll need to flip a switch and climb the hanging specimens to reach the upper floors.
But even after reaching the very top and defeating Messmer, there’s an entire area you can miss. Starting from the Backroom Site of Grace, climb the tall ladder and go up the stairs. To the right there’s a destroyed section of wall leading to scaffolding you can cross. This bonus path leads to a whole new section of the storehouse, and one of the most precarious locations in the game. The lift here leads to the loft. The wooden beams high above the main tower are guarded by giant bats and you’ll have very little room to dodge their attacks. Circling the loft also leads to a hidden lift leading down to the very back of the Shadow Keep – which also leads to a totally optional boss.
We won’t spoil too much here, but fighting the boss leads to a very good reward. You’ll be able to access the Scaduview tower and collect a pile of five Scadutree Fragments. That’s a huge haul of upgrade items – and there are more challenges to find here. There’s an even bigger secret to unlock at the chapel, but we’ll cover that in a later entry. Just finding the loft is fun enough.
#8. Bonny Village
Much earlier in the game, you’ll be able to access one of the creepiest locations in the entire series. The Bonny Village is a horror show – and getting there can be a big surprise. If you want to access the lower levels of the Shadow Keep, you’ll need to travel through Bonny Village and endure the butchers inside.
On the early Scadu Altus plateau, you’ll find a giant crater called Moorth Ruins. The hole in the ground looks impossible to traverse, but if you move carefully while riding Torrent, you can safely drop down to the bottom of the sinkhole. At the very lowest point, you’ll find a cave that leads to a ladder – and that ladder takes you up to Bonny Village.
Bonny Village is the home of the potentates – naked butchers with giant knives, ready to saw the flesh from your bones. The entire village is packed with pots everywhere, and if you’ve visited any of the nearby jails, you’ll know what’s cooking in those pots. This is the only location where you’ll encounter the naked butchers, and they’re seemingly everywhere. The NPCs sharpen their blades when they approach, specifically to apply more bleed – for having unique enemies you can’t find anywhere else, we had to list Bonny Village. Just look at this place. There’s nothing bonny about it!
#7. The Sunken Chapel
After visiting the Bonny Village, your Tarnished can travel north and into a tunnel leading into the side-entrance of Shadow Keep. Instead of entering the keep proper, you’ll reach the Church District, which is completely flooded with insta-death water. To find another optional boss and explore more spooky locations, you’ll need to drain the water – and like so much else in the expansion, this is totally optional. Traverse the rooftops and you’ll reach the interior of the large church after dropping down through the roof.
Only the upper floors of the church are available, but with a little exploration you’ll find the way to a tall statue of Marika. From this room, you can take the path toward the shortcut lift leading up to the Specimen Storehouse, or go the opposite way and flip the switch to release all the water from the Church District. While the floodgates are actually pretty easy to find, it took us an absurdly long time to actually get this switch. And there’s an entire town to explore below.
In the flooded ruins, you’ll encounter two Ulcerated Tree Spirits and a swarm of respawning explosive undead corpses. Exploring further, you’ll find the true reason to search the underground. There’s a path leading to one of the lowest areas in the north of the map and one of the biggest bosses. You’ll want to check it all out for yourself.
#6. Rauh Base
Let’s circle back to another one of the best locations in the Realm of Shadow that’s also incredibly easy to overlook. The Rauh Base region is somehow harder to find than the normal ancient Rauh ruins on the plateau a mile up in the sky. The bottom of the overgrown jungle can only be accessed through a hard-to-spot cave in a pond to the north of Moorth Ruins – remember that area? Just to the northeast there’s a small pond dotted with weird ghost worms.
And there’s a cave marked with a statue. Go inside to the poison swamp and travel left through the next cave – it’ll lead all the way to Rauh Base. There’s a lot to check out in the optional area, including a large ruined town with lots of secrets to discover. Our favorite feature of this area is the Nameless Mausoleum where you can defeat a man that just wants to be a bear. Not only can you get a bear weapon and a set of bear-themed armor, you can also travel deeper through the river and fight a powerful Rune Bear. Defeating it earns you a roar of Bear Communion that’s worth all the trouble of reaching it. Even if you can’t use the spell, it’s fun enough just to test once.
#5. Stone Coffin Fissure
In the opposite direction of Rauh, we have the Stone Coffin Fissure. One of the most mysterious locations in the game is found in the far southeast of the map and only accessible through the Cerulean Coast. If you haven’t found the Cerulean Coast, you’ll need to head up the hill to the right of the Castle Ensis camp and locate the Dragon’s Pit optional dungeon. Completing it leads to the Jagged Peaks and the Grand Altar of Dragon Communion. The Dragon Communion spot is worth a visit alone because of the powerful buff item the Dragon Priestess will give you, but let’s dig deeper into the southern coast.
Past the Grand Altar of Dragon Communion, you’ll reach an area full of red plants. On the cliffs to the left, look for giant stone coffins you can drop down onto. This leads to the Cerulean Coast – and leads to one of the strangest locations in the game. Travel across the land bridge to the southernmost edge of the map to discover yet another deep hole leading far underground, kind of like the Moorth Ruins – only so much more. The crater leads deep into the Stone Coffin Fissure, a totally optional dungeon that’s also aggravatingly difficult.
In the huge fissure, you’ll encounter Deathrite Birds and stone golems with sniper precision. From across the map they’ll target you with deadly beams of magic energy, forcing you to carefully weave through the area and destroy them one-by-one. The gauntlet isn’t even the most difficult part of the dungeon. The hidden boss at the end is the real challenge. And to fight him, you’ll need to take a leap of faith from a bull statue’s head. The boss itself is one of the weirdest in the entire series, and the important NPC it guards is even better for anyone that’s really into the lore. If finding and interacting with St. Trina means anything to you, then you’ll want to spelunk into the Stone Coffin Fissure.
#4. The Shaman Village
One of the most mysterious locations in all of Elden Ring is hidden behind a secret door. The Hinterland in the northeast of the map is one of the hardest locations to access in the Realm of Shadow for a good reason – you’ll need to use a gesture to unlock it. Fromsoft is back to their dirty tricks with this secret, but if you’ve defeated Messmer, you’ll be able to unlock the hidden Shaman Village.
From the Commander Gaius boss arena, there’s an optional path to a seemingly dead-end church in the underground. We covered how to find Commander Gaius above, but if you need a reminder, you’ll find the path through a broken exterior wall in the Specimen Storehouse upper floors. You’ll know you’re in the right church if you see a cryptic developer message on the floor.
In this church, use the ‘O Mother’ gesture. This gesture is found northeast of Bonny Village on a body hanging off the cliff. Using it removes the Illusory Wall and gives you access to the Hinterlands section of the map. There are two major areas here – the second Finger Ruins and the Shaman Village.
The Hinterlands are guarded by powerful Tree Sentinel enemies, but the Shaman Village itself is completely abandoned. There are no enemies here. But there are very special items to collect. You’ll find the Golden Braid Talisman for high damage negation against Faith and the Minor Erdtree Faith Spell. The talisman is one of the best to equip before fighting the final boss of the expansion – he’s really big on Faith spells – while the Minor Erdtree is a spell for only the most dedicated Faith builds. You’ll need to raise your Faith to a whopping 70 to use this spell. This spell summons your own personal Erdtree that constantly heals you and allies in an area, making it the most powerful healing spell in the game.
The village itself is incredibly important for the lore. Reading all the items you collect, the Shaman Village might be the true home of Marika. Further east, you’ll find one of the two Finger Ruins – and let’s talk more about those fingers. Elden Ring is about to get very weird.
#3. Cathedral of Manus Metyr Basement
We’re going from one weird location to another. On the way up from Bonny Village, you’ll pass an enormous Cathedral with a very strange pontiff – the abandoned church is where you’ll find the most elaborate character quest in Shadow of the Erdtree. Unlike every other secret area on our list, this location is only available if you progress Ymir’s quest. If you don’t, you won’t be able to explore the creepy basement of Manus Metyr.
Talking to Ymir, he’ll task you with finding strange locations called Finger Ruins. These are essentially secret areas all on their own. Each Finger Ruin is decorated with hundreds of enormous finger-like jagged rocks sticking out of the finger-print patterned dirt and guarded by dangerous alien-like creatures. Swarms of Finger Creepers patrol the area around the ruins, and you’ll find a bell in the very center. Finding both Finger Ruins and ringing both bells leads to the secret third location. There’s one more ruin to find, and it’s right where you least expect it. By returning to the Cathedral between quests, you’ll be able to interact with Ymir’s throne. The throne will move and reveal a ladder leading down to the massive cavern beneath the church – and it’s all fingers. This is easily one of the strangest locations in the entire series, and it only gets stranger after ringing all three bells. After the third bell, you’ll be teleported to the Finger Birthing Chamber. The vast underground alien landscape is unlike anything else in Elden Ring, and the godlike creature you’ll encounter here has to be seen to be believed.
That isn’t even the end of the cathedral’s story. Returning after defeating the boss will initiate yet another hidden boss encounter against Ymir himself, mutated by the power of the fingers and becoming a new mother himself.
#2. Divine Beast Dancing Lion Rematch
One of the most devious field bosses in Shadow of the Erdtree is also pretty well-hidden. You’ll spot the large ruined structure in the center of the Ancient Ruins of Rauh area, but won’t be able to reach them. They’re so tantalizing. A giant structure you can’t quite reach. What’s inside is one of the most diabolical jokes of the entire series. Yes, there’s another Divine Beast Dancing Lion boss to fight, but with a twist.
Backing up, you’ll find the Ancient Ruins of Rauh through a bridge leading out of the Specimen Storehouse. Crossing the giant bridge in the Shadow Keep, you’ll encounter a dense jungle full of mazes – all leading to an important boss fight you can’t skip. But if you want to explore everything in the ancient ruins, you’ll need to circle around underneath the Scarlot Rot church and find stone scaffolding you can just narrowly cross with your mount. Jump across the structure to find a path leading to the great stairs, taking you up to a plateau with an old bridge leading to the huge structure in the distance. The colosseum is where you’ll find a second Divine Beast boss – the first one is located in the Belarut, Tower Settlement area and is seemingly totally optional.
The same is true of this boss, and there’s a dirty twist to his second form. At 50% health, the Divine Beast will summon an entire swarm of basilisks from the ceiling. If you don’t know your Dark Souls lore, these are those big-eyed obnoxious monsters that can kill you instantly. In Elden Ring they release a cloud of deathblight gas that will end your run in seconds if your meter fills up. This time there’s an entire swarm of them to deal with along with the boss. That’s one of the most evil tricks Fromsoft has ever pulled. Just completely diabolical.
Defeating the Field Boss drops the Divine Beast Tornado Spell – one of the most power spells in the Dancing Lion’s arsenal. Now you can enjoy launching enemies into the stratosphere with the power of tornadoes.
#1. The Abyssal Woods
The one area you absolutely don’t want to miss in Elden Ring is also the creepiest. The deepest depths of the Realm of Shadow are where you’ll find its most unstoppable enemies – literally. There are creatures you can’t fight and kill just by looking at you. The Abyssal Woods are a dead place with a hidden Legacy Dungeon that’s everything we want in a Dark Souls expansion. And you can miss it all if you’re not thoroughly exploring every dungeon.
To find the Abyssal Woods, let’s rewind back to the start of the list. Reaching the Ruins of Unte through an illusory wall, there’s more to find in the rivers and waterways beneath the Shadow Keep. Following the river south and toward a spooky forest at the base of the waterfalls, you’ll want to search for a dungeon called the Darklight Catacombs. This mini-dungeon is pitch black, so you’ll need a lantern and a lot of bravery to reach the bottom floor. Navigating the horrors of this dungeon is spooky enough, but you’ll know you’ve found something unique when you reach the boss arena. Instead of a small room like most optional dungeons, you’ll step into a lush autumn forest. Defeat the teleporting Jori, Elder Inquisitor to enter the Abyssal Woods proper.
This vast hidden forest is almost completely empty. You’ll find sparse enemies – and your mount won’t respond to your calls. You’ll need to travel on-foot while dodging the terrifying denizens of the deep. Strange creatures with bulbous heads and walking canes patrol the fields between the trees. If they look at you, you’ll be infected with the Frenzy status effect, which deals extreme damage when the meter is full. You’ll have to sneak past them to reach the source of the insanity. Midra’s Manse is a full Legacy Dungeon in the heart of the Abyssal Woods, and it’s the real deal. Haunted hallways, illusory walls and kooky switches pack the abandoned mansion. At the very end, you’ll have to face off against the Lord of Frenzy himself, and it’s one of the best encounters in the game.
The Abyssal Woods and Midra’s Manse are some of our favorite locations in the entire Dark Souls series. For switching up the formula and forcing you to sneak by enemies, Elden Ring has taken its final form as a horror game.
And that’s 10 secret locations you’ll want to check out in Shadow of the Erdtree. We tried to stick to only the biggest locations – areas you can actually explore with mysteries to uncover – but there’s so many more tiny secrets to discover all over the expansion map. If you’re eager to see more, stick with us as we continue to reveal everything we can about the biggest Souls DLC yet.
