The Red River Ruins puzzle in Crimson Desert is one of many Ancient Ruins that have some sort of puzzle you can solve in exchange for a new fast-travel location, making navigating the enormous map of Pywel that little bit easier.
That said, this puzzle is a little different to others you may have come across during your adventure. To help you with solving it quickly and continuing your journey, here’s the Crimson Desert Red River Ruins puzzle solution.
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Crimson Desert Red River Ruins puzzle solution
Upon arriving at the Red River Ruins in Crimson Desert, you’ll be presented with a dial that you can push/pull, and across the cavern from the dial, there’s a statue with their axe, sword, and shield glowing gold. How to solve this puzzle may not be apparent yet, but it will be shortly!
Push the dial clockwise and look across the cavern, towards the glowing statue, as you do. The three doors beside the glowing statue will open to reveal three carvings that are also holding glowing items (pictured below).
Now, if you use the D-pad to equip your bow and arrow then shoot the illuminated columns beside each of these carvings, they’ll rotate to reveal a different carving that holds a different glowing item. You’ll also notice that as long as you aren’t pushing the dial here, the doors will slowly close on the carvings, so you’ll need to be quick to fire your arrow.
You might be able to see where this is going now… Your goal for this puzzle is to shoot the carvings so that the glowing item held by each of them matches the three glowing items held by the central, non-moving statue. So, you need to rotate the carvings to reveal a glowing axe, sword, and shield.
To quickly do this, you need to do the following. It’s also worth noting that once a carving is holding the correct item, it’ll glow blue.
- Shoot the left-hand side of the left-most carving twice to reveal an axe.
- Shoot the left-hand side of the middle carving (the one directly to the right of the non-moving statue) to reveal a sword.
- Shoot the right-hand side of the right-most carving once to reveal a shield.
Once that’s all done, a glowing blue podium that holds your reward – an Abyss Cresset – is revealed beneath the statues. You can fly over to it to reach it!
Crimson Desert Red River Ruins puzzle location
The Red River Ruins are just above the Red River in Crimson Desert. They are directly to the west of the Rainforest Eye Watchtower.
Their location is marked on the below map from MapGenie:
Good luck solving the Red River Ruins puzzle. For more on Crimson Desert, take a look at the best armour, all fast-travel locations you can find, and all Strongbox locations if you’re looking for more loot.
