All-Mother Mountain is an unmarked location in Horizon Zero Dawn. It is a sacred mountain located inside the Nora settlement Mother's Watch. The mountain embodies the Nora deity All-Mother.
Description[]
Normally locked off to all Nora except the High Matriarchs, the entrance to All-Mother Mountain is protected by a wood palisade encirclement. After entering the mountain, a wide ramp slopes downward, flanked by ceremonial candles. To the right is a small doorway that leads to hallway. This hallway branches into multiple small rooms.
At the end of the ramp is a sizable landing, to the left of which is what is worshiped as the physical embodiment of All-Mother herself; a large Old Ones bunker door about 20 foot in diameter, built into the rock wall of the cave. A circular pedestal in front of the door serves as a platform upon which entrance to the cradle facility is requested. A bright blue light shines onto the landing once the bunker door is opened.
It was from this door that, to the Nora, it seemed Aloy was birthed. After being birthed in an artificial womb, Aloy was placed by one of the facility's servitor robots (under the direction of the AI GAIA) on the entrance pedestal in front of the door, to be found by the tribespeople inhabiting the area.
A synthetic voice emanates from the bunker door when approached, as with most other Old Ones' bunker doors. This voice reinforces the Nora's belief that there is a spirit within the mountain that protects the tribe's people.
The bunker door houses ELEUTHIA-9, a GAIA cradle facility and a part of Project Zero Dawn.
History[]
About 700 years prior to the events of the game, the ancestors of the known tribes were released from the ELEUTHIA-9 facility through the bunker door. These ancestors were not educated beyond a kindergarten level due to the sabotage of the APOLLO sub-function of GAIA. This lack of knowledge led to the formation of tribal societies, especially the Nora.
As the centuries passed, the bunker door that the ancestors were released from became part of an elaborate myth to the Nora tribe. This myth made the bunker door and the mountain surrounding it out to be a protective deity called All-Mother. This deity, according to Nora myth, defeated the Metal Devil, actually a Titan-class Horus machine and part of the Faro Swarm that at one point assaulted the mountain in an effort to destroy the cradle facility within. The Horus lays dormant atop All-Mother, and its long-reaching metal tentacles can be seen piercing the ceiling of the cave in front of the bunker door.
Aloy[]
One day, the Matriarchs heard cries coming from the mountain. Upon investigating, they discovered a newborn baby girl lying before the bunker door. With no sign of the child's mother, the Matriarchs were left to form their own conclusions. High Matriarch Teersa believed the child to be a gift, born from All-Mother herself; High Matriarch Lansra deemed the child a curse, sired by the Metal Devil to bring ruin upon the Nora. In actuality, the child was a clone of Alpha Prime Elisabet Sobeck, created from stored genetic inside ELEUTHIA-9: months prior, GAIA self-destructed after a mysterious signal turned its subordinate functions into independent entities, in order to prevent the subfunction HADES from seizing control and causing a second global extinction. Before its sacrifice, GAIA ordered ELEUTHIA-9 to gestate the clone, determining the child would have the strongest chance of rebuilding GAIA and restoring the terraforming system.
Lansra's fear prevailed over Teersa's optimism (likely influenced by superstition surrounding a motherless child), and the Nora refused to raise the child as one of them. However, even Lansra could not bring herself to kill the child, so the Matriarchs agreed to entrust her to an honorable outcast named Rost, who named her "Aloy" and raised as a daughter.
Eighteen years later, Aloy nearly perished in the Proving Massacre. Despite Lansra's protests, Teersa and her fellow High Matriarch Jezza had Aloy nursed back to health in the mountain. Upon waking, Aloy was guided by Teersa to the place she was found and told the truth of her discovery. Aloy was denied access by the door due to corruption of its Alpha Registry (a side-effect of the subordinate functions escaping GAIA's destruction), but the door's initial recognition confirmed Teersa's belief that it recognized Aloy. Determined to learn more, Teersa and Jezza gave Aloy the rank of Seeker, allowing her to leave Nora Sacred Lands to seek answers and hopefully "heal" the corruption.
The Eclipse assault[]
Aloy eventually recovered an intact Alpha Registry from the Zero Dawn Project Facility beneath Sunfall, but by then Helis had launched a devastating attack on the Sacred Lands with the intent of killing the entire Nora tribe. As the Eclipse's forces broke through to the Embrace, the Nora retreated to the Mountain. Aloy's timely arrival boosted the morale of the survivors, who rushed to her aid to fight off the assault. With the assault stopped, Aloy repaired the Cradle's Alpha registry and ventured into ELEUTHIA-9. There, Aloy finally learned the full truth of her origins, a revelation which nearly shattered her, as well as parts of the truth surrounding the origins of the known tribes.
For the time being, most of the Nora remain in the Mountain's shelter.
Trivia[]
- All-Mother Mountain is what the Old Ones called Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado.
- In-game, All-Mother Mountain can be seen from places as far as the Spearshafts and Meridian.
Gallery[]
References[]