The Ruined Hvergelmir
Last updated 2026-09-09
The Ruined Hvergelmir is a point of interest located in Pale Crown Palace, White Birch Snowgrave, Snezhnaya.
It is the former site of the Hvergelmir research institute that has since come into ruin.
During the World Quest To Gaze Upon the Dreaming Pale Crown in Series On One Side a Palace, On the Other a Tomb, the player can explore the past and intact Hvergelmir research institute.
The location involves four laboratories belonging to the leading researchers of Hvergelmir:
- Aksinya — "Court Jester"
- Alvis — Grand Duke of the Domovoy
- Koshchei the Deathless
- Pavlina — Grand Duchess of the Snegurochka
Quests
World Quests
Interactables
Koshchei's lab
The Alchemist's Notes (I)
...The core challenge in retaining the characteristics of two or more organisms within a single individual is, in truth, the question of maintaining different circulatory systems within a single body.
Ordinary bio-alchemy can solve this problem via an artificial organ known as the Prime Chimeric Nexus.
After resolving the corresponding rejection reactions, one can allow embryos with different properties to form an internal circulatory system specific to the embryonic organism via this organ.
Once a system is formed, the different "components" of the different embryos can be combined during growth, resulting in a Chimeric Beast.
The Prime Chimeric Nexus can only support up to three different embryo types... This is the limit, according to accepted knowledge.
Aksinya says the data indicates the limit is, in fact, five. I made a bet with her that if she can indeed create a Prime Chimeric Nexus that supports five embryos, I will take her to Podvorye Restaurant for drinks in secret.
...
The Embryonic-Ichoric-Telluric-Rudiment (henceforth "Eitr") has changed everything. It is as if we have obtained the final form of the Prime Chimeric Nexus.
It is like a living bio-furnace that can devour any living embryo without limitations.
And its products are nothing like the previous Chimeric Beasts, which had to undergo nurturing cycles to await their growth and harmonization before reaching a completed stage.
Instead, the Eitr swallows, then fully absorbs the embryos, and directly reconstructs their biological traits. And even with that, the number of circulatory systems remains but one.
This must have been the foundation stone for developing a sort of perfect life form.
...
The Eitr is indeed the most perfect of all Hyperborean creations. Its sole weakness is that it is far too perfect...
To the point where it cannot preserve the special components of each organism, as would occur using the Prime Chimeric Nexus.
Perhaps we should consider ways to isolate the biological characteristics from organisms formed from the Eitr?
Ah, I get it now. This must be why the Hyperboreans only created the Leshy in the later stages of their Eitr research...
They must have turned away from the Eitr's bio-furnace in search of more stable forms of life, ones closer to eternity...
...
The five-embryo-compatible Prime Chimeric Nexus that Aksinya constructed only lasted a few breaths in a stable state.
I warned her that this was a low-probability coincidence involving multiple factors that could not be replicated.
She said, "But your bet was about whether or not it could support five embryo types!"
I said that this technology was purely developed for our bet, with neither practical applications nor developmental potential.
She said, "But your bet was about whether or not it could support five embryo types!"
...
She didn't want to drink at all. She only ordered some non-alcoholic soft drinks at Podvorye Restaurant.
I spent more Mora bribing the Pale Crown Palace guards than she spent on drinks. Seriously, what an unreasonable woman.
...Perhaps she just wanted to take a look outside the palace?
The Alchemist's Notes (II)
...The experiment is complete.
Aksinya believes it finished as per its designated direction, and thus, a success. And indeed, it is a grand endeavor most worthy of praise.
But can this really be called a success?
So-called eternal love... the so-called courtyard of eternal bliss...
Is that is not merely a dead end with neither change nor improvement?
...
What "shared love"? Is this the world she desires, where all shall love all... Yet love should not be such a thing.
If all differences in this world were to disappear, and all were to be blended into one, what would we be "loving," precisely?
There would be nothing to project love outward upon, nor would there be any corresponding entity within to love.
A "love" created by removing the key elements behind love is nothing but a falsehood, an empty shell.
...
The person within the egg is right.
"He" speaks truth. Aksinya has not perceived the terrifying essence of eternal love.
I cannot... allow her plan to come to final fruition. His Majesty Monomakh has passed, but I know she has not given up simply on that account...
Before the time comes, we must stop her. The person within the egg... I agree with "his" plan.
I know, however, that she will one day surely return, breaking free from the shackles of the land of shadows.
When that time comes, I shall prove to her... that love will not be eroded by cold silence, not even in the grand scheme of eternity.
Message
Only available during To Gaze Upon the Dreaming Pale Crown
- Message: (A note, written in an elegant hand...)
- Message: "I will be returning to the House of Hesperides for the next few days, so I'll leave the cat in your care. I can hardly trust the others with her, given how absorbed they become in their experiments."
- Message: "I am sure my colleague Koshchei shares my respect for living things and will remember to feed my Lara... The key and specially prepared cat food are on your desk."
- Message: "...And remember, my Lara only eats from her bowl. Please don't scatter her food on the floor. She won't eat anything off the floor."
- Message: "P.S. If I find that my cat has not been properly fed, or that she has somehow grown parts from another animal, I will find out who is responsible. — Pavlina"
Pavlina's lab
Someone's Notes
Only available during To Gaze Upon the Dreaming Pale Crown
- Someone's Notes: (A note, written in a cold, stiff hand with almost no variation...)
- Someone's Notes: "...The prisoners used as experimental material have already been handed over to Alvis. There is no doubt that the results of that experiment were 'incorrect.'"
- Someone's Notes: "But is that what humans... Is that what loveless fae should seek as 'love'? Perhaps the Snegovik, incomplete in spirit as they are, truly could make use of this technology..."
- Someone's Notes: "To gain the 'love' they lacked from the beginning. Just as... just as 'he' told me, dreams that are too grand have no meaning. Perhaps..."
- Someone's Notes: "Perhaps 'he' was right. That power... That power should have been ours from the start, as compensation. It was never meant to belong to Aksinya's aberrant dream."
- Someone's Notes: "...I will stop here before Alvis 'accidentally' comes across this again and causes more trouble."
Alvis's lab
Grand Duke Alvis's Notes
...Even after His Majesty's passing, Hvergelmir remains within my control. This, perhaps, is why His Majesty entrusted everything to me while he yet walked amongst us.
An alchemist who knows only to trample life into the mud, a young Snegurochka dissatisfied with her own race, and... *sigh* Aksinya, the Court Jester whom His Majesty coddled all too much...
How could they possibly survive this tumultuous situation on their own?
They will still have to rely on my methods, will they not?
...
Yet we Domovoy were never ones to do business at a loss, Your Majesty, the late, great, Belyi Tsar...
Naturally, I have the means to protect this secret chamber, sitting precariously as it does like an egg in an overturned nest. But all within it shall be mine to claim.
The great sighing in my mind has grown more frequent.
The person in the egg, the creature who was created... dares to lecture me?
Yet "his" words are not bereft of sense.
...
I will have vengeance upon [...], yet this move must not be discovered by the one who sits upon the new throne...
The destruction of Kitezhgrad appears to me a perfect opportunity to avoid the cleansing directed at [...]
Snezhnaya shall need a new Kitezhgrad, and that shall be my great work. Once accomplished, even the one on the new throne shall have no choice but to acknowledge me.
Before that, I should... I shall get the share I deserve. It is what "he" promised to me. I must obtain that power.
And after that, once Novokitezhgrad has been established, we can move Hvergelmir to that new city in secret.
Everything here shall be of aid to my research... All so I can get closer... to that person within my mind...
Unnamed Potion Formula
Only available during To Gaze Upon the Dreaming Pale Crown
What makes matter cease to be matter? What allows the Transcender to transcend?
Kresnik crystal ore should be the ideal material. It is power refined from the authority released when the colossal beast of (...) from ages past lost control, making it the substance whose nature most closely resembles the conditions surrounding the birth of (...).
Perhaps... Separated, everything is not the cause. For everything to be everything, what was divided must be gathered back into one?
Aksinya's lab
Notes by a Certain Noble Individual (VI)
...The "passage" stands open anew... Time grows brief...
...By the swiftness with which the Abyss seeps into the world, it appears that all contained within the celestial shell shall draw to a close within a few centuries... Rotwang has arrived at a similar conclusion after undertaking his own calculations...
...I fear I must set forth before long. Yet, the plan I have set in motion shall not cease nonetheless...
...I am willing to give up all that I possess to further advance this world, and for the sake of all who have sacrificed for the future. I am willing to yield my blood, my flesh, and even...
Jotted Letter
- Jotted Letter: All for a world free of sorrow
Gallery
Other Languages
| Language | Official Name | Literal Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| English | The Ruined Hvergelmir | — |
| Chinese (Simplified) | 已然破碎的「谧源所」 Yǐrán Pòsuì de "Mìyuánsuǒ" | The Already Broken "Hvergelmir Tooltip for Hvergelmirⓘ" |
| Chinese (Traditional) | 已然破碎的「謐源所」 Yǐrán Pòsuì de "Mìyuánsuǒ" | |
| Japanese | すでに壊れた「静源所」 | The Already Broken "Hvergelmir Tooltip for Hvergelmirⓘ" |
| Korean | 파괴된 「근원 연구소」 Pagoedoen "Geunwon Yeon'guso" | |
| Spanish | El Hvergelmir destruido | |
| French | Hvergelmir en ruines | Ruined Hvergelmir |
| Russian | Разрушенная Обитель Безмолвия Razrushennaya Obitel' Bezmolviya | |
| Thai | "Hvergelmir" ที่พังทลาย | |
| Vietnamese | Hvergelmir Đã Vụn Vỡ | |
| German | Das bereits zerbrochene „Hvergelmir“ | The Already Broken "Hvergelmir" |
| Indonesian | The Ruined Alypium | |
| Portuguese | Alypium Destruído | |
| Turkish | Harap Olmuş Alypium | |
| Italian | Alypium in rovina |
