Turns out this Elden Ring summon can tame and ride giant enemy wolves

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An immobile NPC becomes quite mobile when paired with a friendly pooch.

Lateena the Spirit Ash in Elden Ring.
(Image credit: Fromsoftware)

Some old grumps might think Elden Ring is too big, but for many others the joy of the Lands Between lies in how many secrets it keeps serving up—whether that's speedrunners somehow glitching the game to completion in minutes, or hardy sorts butt-stomping their way to the Elden Throne. This one isn't quite on that scale, but a surprising reminder of how many unexpected interactions may yet remain to be discovered.

Player @rasukuclaver shared this element of the game, and here's your chance to watch it unfold and be shaken to your very core, before I explain what's going on.

No, the explanation is not just " she got on the wolf, dawg." The NPC companion being summoned here is a Spirit Ash called Latenna the Albinauric, and you obtain this through a side-quest featuring the character (here is how to get hold of her).

Latenna's found in front of the Slumbering Wolf's Shack in Liurnia of the Lakes, and after completing various steps she will willingly join the player in order to help them towards the Haligtree. In order to do this though, she abandons her wolf companion:

"Then I suppose it's time. Farewell, Lobo. My faithful wolf, my better half. I will go with the Tarnished. So that our journey will not have been in vain. Forgive me, Lobo."

The Spirit Ash description reads that "having lost her beloved wolf companion, Lobo, she cannot move from the place where she was summoned."

Elden Ring has giant enemy Direwolves. Summon Latenna around one and she will attract it towards her, somehow charm it, and take to their back. This not only gives a normally stationary character greater movement and survivability, but unlocks the Freezing Mist attack from her mount (as can be seen above).

This isn't game-changing, really. It just means that one of your Spirit Ash companions has an extra layer to it, which happens to be badass, and can therefore be of incredible use in the right context: Latenna is cool and all, but a wolf-mounted Latenna is ice-cold. I mean: she got on the wolf, dawg.

Rich Stanton
Rich Stanton
Senior Editor

Rich is a games journalist with 15 years' experience, beginning his career on Edge magazine before working for a wide range of outlets, including Ars Technica, Eurogamer, GamesRadar+, Gamespot, the Guardian, IGN, the New Statesman, Polygon, and Vice. He was the editor of Kotaku UK, the UK arm of Kotaku, for three years before joining PC Gamer. He is the author of a Brief History of Video Games, a full history of the medium, which the Midwest Book Review described as "[a] must-read for serious minded game historians and curious video game connoisseurs alike."