Path of Exile 2

If you're playing the new Rise of the Abyssal league in Path of Exile 2, sooner or later you'll pick up an Abyssal Bone and wonder what on earth to do with it. The game hints that you can use it to desecrate gear, but it never really explains how. The answer you're looking for is tied to a special location called the Well of Souls, which you can first reach in Act 2.

The first thing you should know is that Abyssal Bones come in several types, each tied to a specific PoE 2 item.

• Jawbone → PoE 2 weapons and quivers
• Rib → PoE 2 armor pieces
• Collarbone → PoE 2 rings, amulets, and belts
• Cranium → PoE 2 jewels
• Vertebrae → PoE 2 Waystones

The Well of Souls itself is not easy to find. When you're exploring the Mastodon Badlands, look for a side cave called the Lightless Passage. Push through it and you'll eventually emerge at the Well. Think of this place as the seasonal hub, where an NPC called the “Lurking Creature” takes care of all desecration. Once you've been there once, it becomes a permanent fast-travel option on your waypoint menu, sitting alongside other special league locations.
The Well is a crafting spot and the core of the league. Waystones can be desecrated with Vertebrae to add special modifiers to zones, changing the difficulty or rewards of encounters. Later in the league, the Well also serves as the entry point to extra boss fights, including challenges against Abyssal Commanders.
The desecration process itself is straightforward but loaded with risk and reward, just like Path of Exile players expect. You hand over an Abyssal Bone along with a piece of gear, and the item comes back changed. Sometimes you'll roll a powerful new property; other times you'll get something awkward or situational. Either way, it's the heart of the league, and the only way to engage with it is by farming those glowing green Abyssal Rifts that appear in each zone. Clear a rift, fight through packs of abyssal enemies, and at the end you'll open a chest with a chance at more Bones.

To make things more interesting, there are also Abyssal Omens that give you extra control over desecration.

• Omen of Echoes lets you reroll your desecration options.
• Omen of Putrefaction pushes the item toward maximum modifiers but corrupts it.
• Others limit changes to only prefixes or suffixes

These Omens reduce pure RNG and add a strategic layer to the system.

One important detail: if an item is already full of modifiers, desecration will overwrite one existing affix with the new abyssal property. That means you could gain something amazing, but you also risk losing a valuable stat. High-end crafting in this league always carries this tension.
If you're serious about the league, you should clear every Rift you encounter during the campaign. Drops aren't guaranteed, and Bones take up inventory space, so it's tempting to skip them at first, but they are essential for powering up your character later on.