Un'Goro Crater wants to kill you
S1. E5. (World of Warcraft)
Un'Goro Crater wants to kill you.
To get there you have to walk down a path flattened by giant beasts you hope are long extinct.
As you descend you hear the chatter of insects. The wind stops under the rockline. Even it can't survive here. With each step the sides raise up around you, and the sky shrinks into a circle. The crater works like a magnifying glass, everything is smaller looking out, but everything inside becomes twice as large.
There is no path to follow here. You cut through brush and skip past open spaces. Smaller skeletons found within larger skeletons. Both rotted away or hunted by something even bigger. Weak creatures that didn’t pay enough attention. The cycle of life and death unfolds here in real time. It's crowded with apex predators. Survival of the fittest is not just a slogan. Not an empty threat. This is biology in action. Mourn them and move on. You can’t stop anywhere for long.
All the senses get overwhelmed in the crater, but smell most of all. Impossible smells rise out of the ground. Sinister breath lingers in the air. The fumes from the toxic trap of the tar pits. Flowers you can’t name spit out acrid pollen. Their spores linger on your clothes when you brush up against them. Nothing is stationary, everything moves. Everything grabs at you, crawls up you, attaches itself to your skin.
Nothing feels fresh either. Though waterfalls run in from the sides the sticky energy of the place turns it into a bog. Swamps topped with stale eggs and river beds that are deeper than they first appear. If you can see the bottom, know that you can’t stand on it. Swimming here is unthinkable. At times you traverse swamps and rivers that give way so fast you start off with water at your shins, and finish with it at your neckline. Your clothes are sodden, but the humidity has meant that they were like that from the moment you arrived.
There is one landmark in the middle. Fireplume Ridge. The hot nucleus in the centre of the circle. As you approach the ground turns black and the smell of sulphur overwhelms the rest of the scents. The lava pours out of the sides of the volcano in erratic bursts. Caves and corners give way to magma. You walk on tiptoes and struggle to stand in the cinders. Uneasy footing over a river of fire. Elementals leap out of the flames, surprising you with their white hot heat. Move round the ridge and get to somewhere safe. Don’t stop.
Further on the journey there are creatures you hear before you see. You look around for somewhere to hide. But there isn’t enough light to find a safe space. The air is so thick you want to brush it out of your eyes. A palpable atmosphere. In such a dangerous place you wonder what kind of creature would be so audible. Its lack of fear makes it even scarier than the things that slide and slither out of sight. Worse than the living hives of insects bigger than you, scars on the landscape that twitch with activity.
Others live at altitude, clinging onto the cliffs for survival. You want to scrabble up the side of this mountain too, because it feels safer than spending your time in the pit. But there are gorillas and pterodactyls and bandits. And they must maintain their territory. Still, the caves are cool, the stone works to keep the temperature down. Stay at the mouth for a few minutes, let it recuperate you and dry the sweat on your back.
There are scattered camps of survivors up here. Some who have fallen into the crater and have no way of getting out. Then there are the ones that choose to stay. They are best avoided. They bring a reckless energy that, when mixed with the noxious air, makes you feel uneasy. They give you tasks, ask favours, and then say ‘it’s dangerous to go alone’. Nobody in their right mind wants to join you.
After all, this place shouldn’t exist. It’s a cosmic experiment. Or maybe it’s an accident. A giant puddle formed from a footprint of a beast that created the continents of the world. There’s certainly no consistency here. Ethereal surprises round every corner. Glowing shards that are tempting to touch. Unusual heat emanating off their points. Touching them would give you thousands of bright blue splinters. But the urge remains.
Can there be beauty in a place so deadly? Is the pattern of a toxic frog irresistible? The glimmer of a scale from a dinosaur who’s spine fans out at a length of a building. Should you admire the doors of its mouth, ringed with teeth, or the scales of its spine tightly sealed together along its back? It is treacherous to look for too long, but just as it's impossible to avoid threat here, it’s impossible not to be drawn to it either.
Don’t get enamoured. There is no way to traverse the crater except quickly. Run from side to side and take whichever route is possible. There can be no rest and there can be no admiration. If you must, stand on the lip of the crater from Feralas or Tanaris. Look down and see it in its entirety. A pit of danger. A marble of evil. The host wanted to remove you. Be glad you got out whilst you could.
This is essay five in a set of six travel essays about World of Warcraft and Azeroth. To read the rest click here. For information on future seasons and games click here.