Into the Fungal Wastes - Hollow Knight Guide - IGN (2024)

This page of the IGN Hollow Knight Wiki Guide includes instructions on how to navigate the Fungal Wastes, the third major area in Hollow Knight.

For information on other sections, be sure to check out the rest of our Walkthrough. To learn how to obtain the various Collectibles Hollow Knight has to offer, visit our pages on Charms, Spells, Mask Shards, and more.

From the Queen’s Station Bench, head right into Queen’s Station, then take the exit in the upper right corner and you’ll arrive in the Fungal Wastes. Dodge or kill the poison-spewing balloon-type enemies and take the exit at the bottom of the screen and you’ll Cornifer’s signature humming. Descend and take the first left and you’ll find him in an alcove.

Purchase the Fungal Wastes area map for 75 Geo, then go back up to the previous area and head right. Continue through the right side exit, then head up through the shaft, dodging the explosive spores as you go.

Several passageways are blocked off, so take the only exit available and continue right into the next area. After dispatching or bypassing the new shrieking mushroom enemies, head up to the upper platform and proceed left, back into the previous area through the top left exit. Slash the lever to unlock the gate, then hop up through the top exit and enter the gated arena to initiate the Shrumal Ogre miniboss encounter.

At the beginning of the fight, you’ll only engage a single ogre, so avoid the orange ooze and slash the foe a few times, or unleash several volleys of Vengeful Spirit (especially if you bought the Shaman Stone from Charm Lover Salubra) to dispatch them, then focus your attention to the other ogre.

NOTE: If you stay close to the ogres for a prolonged period of time, they’ll initiate a quick, repeated headbutt attack, so initiate hit-and-run tactics to make easy work of the minibosses.

After you have destroyed the two Shrumal Ogres, a Charm Notch upgrade will fall from the ceiling. Pick it up to increase your Charm slots by 1, then continue to the next area to the right and ascend, taking the first exit to the right to meet Leg Eater.

Leg Eater will request a nominal fee to "see something nice," so pay up and you'll gain access to a useful Charm vendor.

Leg Eater only sells three charms, but each of them are quite powerful. Fragile Heart increases the Knight's available health by two Masks, Fragile Greed increases the amount of Geo the Knight receives from all sources, and Fragile Strength increase damage dealt. Each of the Fragile Charms is broken upon death, but Leg Eater can repair them for a relatively low fee, and they can be upgraded later to become unbreakable.

After you've made your purchases, head back down to the bottom of the chasm and continue to the right. Once you’ve reached the vertical shaft at the end of the path, descend through the acid-filled chasm until you reach the bottom, then head left and into the next area, where you’ll meet a fellow adventurer named Cloth.

Continue past Cloth, into the next area. This area has purple fungus which the Knight can use as bouncing platforms. Utilize the Nail Jump technique and slash downward as you land to gain an extra boost to your jump height and clear the acid pit. Continue down until you reach the bottom of the area and you’ll see Hornet run into the next area to the right, but we don’t have the necessary item to follow her, so head left instead, and continue down into the area below.

As you descend through the next vertical area, take the first exit on the left by Nail Jumping, then dashing off a cluster of purple fungus. Follow the corridor left until you reach a lever which unlocks a shortcut back to the Queen’s Station Stagway and Bench.

After unlocking the shortcut, return to the previous vertical chamber and continue down. Once you reach the bottom, head right. At this point, you’ll begin to to encounter Mantis enemy types.