Monte Hermoso del Fuego (“Beautiful Mount of Fire”) is a mountain of Vala, a “celestial embassy” where souls are tested, with a volcano at its base and seven levels of ascent to an earthly paradise. Unlike Vala’s other mountains, it sometimes rises and flies.
| Type | Mountain; celestial embassy |
| Spanish entry | Monte Hermoso del Fuego |
Location
At the end of the Road of Fire, going south, “not very far”: 120 or 130 miles, about 200 kilometers.
Nature
It is “territory, a celestial embassy” on the world’s soil. Its seven levels are “as if they were seven areas of purgatory one rises through to reach the earthly paradise”: volcano at the base, seven strata of purgation, paradise at the summit.
The flying mountain
In its flying phase it moves and “covers the whole city” beneath it, an unnamed city that is, “for the angels, a city of sin”. It was once estimated that it “may arrive in 5 hours”.
Point of origin
The company was told: “You come from there, from Monte Hermoso del Fuego.”
Conflicting accounts
- The volcano: “some say it is inactive, but others say it is sometimes seen active”.
- The mountain: “for some it is a redeemed world, and for others a nest of fanatics”.
Open questions
- “Why, if there is a diabolical being in the bosom of this world, was there a place called Monte Hermoso del Fuego?” The being and its relation to the embassy are not established.
- How and why it flies, and what happens to the city beneath, are unknown.
- Its surface, the inside of each level and the alleged fanatics are not described.
- Whether the Road of Fire reaches, leaves or runs through it is unknown.
- The will-o’-the-wisps of the Valley of the Tempest and the fire serpent have no established link to it.