(Hollow Knight render by @Insact9704 Artorias render by @IvyJinna)
“I exist, that is all, and I find it nauseating.”
-Jean-Paul Sartre
The Hollow Knight, previously Pure Vessel, raised to peak power all in vain attempt to seal away the infection from Hollow Knight
Knight Artorias, The Abysswalker and one of Gwyn’s four Knights who was destined to fail at defeating the abyss from Dark Souls
What is a knight’s purpose? What is their sole goal that comes with their hefty title? Is it to protect the innocent? Is it to better themselves to slay any enemy in their way? Or is it perhaps both and to serve their supreme ruler; Their king? But there are times, often, that serving that purpose almost becomes one’s sole reason for living, and wouldn’t you do anything just to live another day? Even after your body, your mind, and everything else have been forsaken? Duty leads to sacrifice and sacrifice leads to death, but in so few cases, even then one’s purpose to serve their king does not end. Like with the Hollow Knight, battling through the infection with their best attempts to seal the Radiace, or Artorias, who, even after succumbing to the abyss, still fights to slay its servants. So through infection and sacrifice, which Knight will surrender to death’s hand once their blades clash with each other? A being born of god and void corrupted by the light against a Knight of fire perverted by the abyss. Well, I’ll answer that question in a DEATH BATTLE!
Ay, hold your horses bud.
Going FOUR FOR FOUR, this blog features a very simple media list. The Hollow Knight will receive Hollow Knight (the game, not the guy), the Quirrel comic, and Hollow Knight: Silksong (LMMMAAAOOOOO). Artorias will then primarily use Dark Souls 1, 2, and 3 along with their comics. Interviews and Guides will also be briefly used however, they won’t be the primary sources for this blog.
When it comes to calculations and other sources of research, Ori vs The Knight by Toxin's DB Corner, Ori vs The Knight. . . again? By DBE Blogs, Dark Souls vs Skyrim by G1Blogs, Respect Artorias Thread by U/Kesskas, and various VSBW blogs will be used! Make sure to give everybody here a check out and big thanks to them for everything
Finally! And getting this shit outta the way, HEIGHT will be equalized for this fight. Even using the handy dandy Hollow Knight resize calcs which places The Knight at 26.4 cm or . . . 0.8 ft (This makes The Hollow Knight about 2 feet tall when excluding their big ass horns). Artorias on the other hand is about 11 fucking feet. So yeah, Artorias has a pretty crazy height diff. . . OR DOES HE??? Thanks to Toxin’s DB Corner, again, shoutout, you could argue that the Knight is instead 2 to 4 feet tall. The Hollow Knight is about the size of 3 Knights, so the Knight is either 6 feet tall or a whopping 12 feet, making him TALLER than Artorias when excluding horns. Anyway, we are still equalizing height, but this side tangent was to prove it’s not necessarily important!
Background
Hollow Knight
“No mind to think. No will to break. No voice to cry out suffering. You are the vessel; You are the Hollow Knight.” - The Pale King.
A dream is eternal, a kingdom is not. A simple fact that The Pale King refused to accept when a vile force was assaulting his grand kingdom of Hallownest: An Infection from a forgotten god. No matter what the citizens did, no matter what the Pale King tried, this infection could not be stopped simply because it was no mere physical matter: It was one of the mind itself. A dream turned into corruption. So the Pale King, in all his radiant brilliance, devised a plan to create the perfect antithesis to this forgotten Light, to the Radiance; He would create a being with no mind, no will, and no voice. Together with the White Lady, the two birthed millions of eggs and filled the abyss with them. The void immediately invaded the eggs, a primordial ooze of nothingness that then slaughtered the unborn children before corrupting them and turning them empty, turning them into vessels. The Pale King then waited at the top of this abyss and waited for one Vessel, one of his children, to rise above them all. One did, and he dubbed this child The Hollow Knight.
Brisked off to the White Palace, there the Hollow Knight lived alongside and was nurtured by their parents, along with being thoroughly trained in the arts of nail, soul, and extensive agility. But in this training, a flaw was instilled, a very detrimental one: after completing some training, the Hollow Knight and their Father stared out at the rest of the castle before looking at one another. A peaceful and kind moment of bonding; A moment of mind, of will, and of voice. The Hollow Knight, now with a mind, was well aware of this flaw and dreaded the possibility of being found out, of wasting everyone’s time and efforts, so they tried their best to silence this internal voice with all their will. How unfortunate.
Finally, now raised to a prime form, the Hollow Knight was given its ivory armor and, along with three dreamers, was sealed inside the Black Egg along with the Radiance inside of it. But the Radiance is a clever god, and she realized the Hollow Knight’s insecurities, and she realized their dreams, and so she infected them. The infection broke through this vain attempt, but the Hollow Knight still battled it fruitlessly. That was, until one day, a sibling arrived. The Knight, a smaller vessel, did battle against its larger sibling and, in an act of mercy, relieved them of their goal by defeating them, and then by its choice, either replacing them or destroying the Radiance proper along with their help. Or, in another choice, The Hollow Knight was released from the Radiance fully, and it crept out of their egg to face their sister. For the only thing the Hollow Knight ever knew to do, was to give everything of themself until there was nothing left for their father.
Knight Artorias
“The legend of Artorias art none but a fabrication.Traversing the dark? ‘Tis but a fairy tale.” - Alvina of the Darkroot Wood
In the beginning, there was nothing but dark that was, until primordial humanity ushered in an age of light: An age of fire. Gwyn, the Lord of Sunlight, had successfully slain the dragons with the help of his armies and Seath. In his established age of Light, humanity would learn to never know the dark. . . that was until the dark began to claw itself back into existence. Gwyn, fearful of his age being overthrown and replaced by an Age of Dark, ruled by those pitiful humans with their dark souls, decided to offer himself towards the First Flame that allowed his age to even come to bear fruit. As the Lord of the Sun burned his very being to prolong his age, the abyss decided to start making its move to succeed this desperate king. Kaathe, the primordial serpent who desired this age of black, convinced the Four Kings of New Londo of his ways by teaching them unique powers that then corrupted them and their warriors into Darkwraiths. The city of New Londo was beginning to fall victim to the dark, and so the Age of Fire decided to respond with its very best. One of Gwyn’s own appointed four Knights, and one of the greatest warriors alive. The Knight, known as Artorias.
Artorias slaughtered Darkwraith after Darkwraith, however, he could never truly deal with the source of the problem. The Four Kings were in the Abyss, an alternate dimension truly toxic to humans and lords alike, and so Artorias was helpless. Even after he had forged a pact with the Beasts of the Abyss to gain a method to travel into the realm, he could not slay the Four Kings with his own abilities. Without a way to deal with the source of Darkwraiths and the Abyss’s corruption spreading through New Londo, a grim solution was composed: To flood the entire city. It was a horrific scene as hundreds of men, women, and children, and their cultures, and their existence was drowned out to prevent the darkness from spreading. For a time, such a method was seen as necessary, but the Abyss is not so easily halted. Elsewhere, in the kingdom of Oolacile, Kaathe decided to manipulate humanity again to evoke the darkness. This time, instead of tempting them with its power, he would have them upset the dark’s very origin: The creator of the Abyss, Manus.
The darkwraiths spread out, and the Abyss had the kingdom in its clutches. Artorias arrived, ready to do battle with this foul man along with his companion, Sif, but once he battled Manus in the Abyss, it was clear that this battle was for naught. In his final moments of sanity, he gave Sif his shield to protect him from the darkness as he was quickly taken by it. For a thousand years, Artorias was corrupted by dark. In Oolacile, he wandered, killing darkwraiths and Bloatheads until one a fateful day, he encountered the Chosen Undead, displaced from their time. Driven by his ceaseless bloodlust, Artorias battled the warrior but, too, could not match this one’s power. Artorias was slain, finally put to rest, and a legend would be born out of his failed efforts because of some faulty eyesight. Centuries later, even when the Knight and his age had been long gone, the tales of the Abysswalker would continue to persist and encourage those across the land to fight against the darkness.
Experience & Skill
Hollow Knight
Immediately from their very conception, Vessels are already taught, or more accurately forced, to climb and battle their way out of the Abyss; The Hollow Knight was one of the first Vessels to complete this task successfully and was thus went off to the White Palace to be trained into “Prime Form.” which they clearly achieved since they are gigantic! In this training, the Hollow Knight likely learned all forms of combat via Nail and Magic. When it comes to battling with a “sword”, the Hollow Knight is capable of parrying [As seen above] and effectively using their weapons’ reach via thrusting and slashing attacks.
More interestingly, the Hollow Knight is a very skilled SOUL Magic practitioner. Unlike their younger siblings, the Hollow Knight is capable of using their very focus spell offensively and manifesting a variety of weapons. Similar to their siblings—but like the primordial void—The Hollow Knight seems to have a grasp on their VOID powers as well, and they’re capable of shapeshifting a portion of it out like whips, teleporting, and even infusing void into their attacks in their infected form.
Knight Artorias
Being given the title of one of Gwyn’s four knights is no light title to bear, and Artorias wears it proudly and is labeled as one of—If not the Greatest—Knight during his era. Artorias is immensely skilled with his blade, even being said to have no match when it comes to wielding a greatsword. With his abilities, he used his prowess against other Knights like Arkon to dispatch him rather quickly and to effectively take advantage of the opponent’s weak points as he did to the very dragons. Artorias is also surprisingly capable of utilizing magic, albeit not very complex spells, but we do know his abilities were potent enough to protect Sif in the Abyss for a short time after he fell to Manus’s power.
Speaking of that power, Artorias’s remaining will proves itself as he even begins to master and utilize the abyss in powerful ways. Artorias not only adapted to a one-arm fighting style after he lost his left arm, but he also managed to use the abyss to his advantage by powering himself up with it and coating his attacks in darkness; These are likely thanks to the fact that his own natural immortality allowed him to live for a thousand years while he was under Manus’ power.
Equipment
Hollow Knight
Nail
Every bug that wants to earn some respect wields a weapon; notably, most Hallownest denizens wield a simple nail. Nails are forged out of Pale Ore, a rare metal, and are fine-tuned for battle. The Hollow Knight’s nail was originally a fine and clean blade, but over the years, it has become chipped and riddled with cracks along its edge.
Knight Artorias
Greatsword of Artorias
Artorias’ trusty greatsword. Being a highly positioned Knight, his own blade matches his measure. . . and his height since it is huge! Artorias’ original blade was charged with divine power, making it quite effective at slaying undead enemies and preventing them from reviving.
Greatsword of Artorias. . . again?
After forming his pact with the beasts of the Abyss to gain the ability to abysswalk, Artorias’ great sword became corrupted by the darkness. Instead of being granted divine attributes, the sword can now cut apart spirits formed from the massacre done in New Londo.
Abyss Greatsword
Remember how—Wait a second, is this seriously the same sword for the third time???
Spending a thousand years in the Abyss has corrupted not only Artorias’s mind and body but even his weapon! Unlike the divine abilities of the Greatsword, this Greatsword instead is further drenched in the Abyss like the Pact blade that could slash through ghosts. This means the sword is empowered by the wielder’s own humanity due in part to the abyss that resides within.
Wolf Ring
Gifted to Artorias by Lord Gwyn himself, this ring grants Artorias the ability to endure more blows without moving, or in the gaming terms, it gives Artorias more poise!
The Silver Pendant
As thanks to his efforts in New Londo, Artorias was gifted this pendant that contained the impressive ability to repel the magic of the abyss. It is so potent that it can even reflect the dark spells cast by Manus, who created the realm in the first place.
Abilities
Hollow Knight
Void Being Physiology
Long before the Mantis tribe, long before the residents of Deppnest, and even long before the Moth tribe, there was an ancient civilization that ruled over the location that would eventually become Hallowest: The Void Civilization. An ancient race of bugs that worshipped the Void. The Void is a volatile substance that seems to have a mind of its own. Not only does it violently lash out against those not seen as part of it, but it has the devastating power to corrupt all that is near it, even if they don’t touch it.
After the Pale King tossed all of his children into the abyss, the eggs were corrupted by the void and formed creatures born of both god and void. These vessels were beings that lacked a mind, a will, and a voice. They can even “defy time,” likely due to the fact that they don’t age one bit. Void beings’ most unique power, however, is their moldability. Not only can vessels disregard their shells entirely to exist as Shades, shades that can even traverse entire dimensions, but void beings’ general typically take the shape of their armors, like the Kingsmold who have multiple limbs or the Collector who is. . . naked? Because of this, the Hollow Knight is capable of freely utilizing the void within them to shapeshift, primarily to turn one of their limbs into whip-like tendrails and even teleporting due to their void nature.
Focus
Nearly every single being in Hallownest possesses a unique energy source known as SOUL that seemingly is born straight from their minds. Soul is the energy that actively animates and gives creature’s life in the world of Hallownest, but truly powerful beings can manipulate soul to either create spells or to heal themselves. As a dead child animated by the void, The Hollow Knight and their siblings cannot naturally generate soul but seem to have the power to steal it from those with it.
The Hollow Knight—as the Pure Vessel at least—seemed to possess an absurd amount of stocked-up soul that allowed them to unleash a variety of attacks. Likely trained in the art of spells in the White Palace, the Hollow Knight is able to unleash their soul brutally through combat. The normal focus spell used by its younger sibling to heal is instead turned into a massive AOE attack that spawns multiple explosive orbs of soul. However, considering it is just focus, it is likely that the Hollow Knight should also be able to heal itself.
Soul Daggers
A unique power that even sorcerers don’t show off is the ability to create constructs. The Hollow Knight is capable of creating daggers composed of the soul they’ve gathered within themselves. These daggers fire off consecutively in a large wave but deal as much damage as one of the Hollow Knight’s own sword swings.
Soul Pillars
When the Hollow Knight needs to stab you ALOT of times in a large distance, they can pierce the ground with their nail and erect multiple ivory pillars of Soul that do, as you expect, as much damage as one of their sword swings.
The Infection
The physical manifestation of the Forgotten God of Light, the infection is a viral orange puss that can manifest from either contact or the mere dreaming of the Radiance herself. The Hollow Knight, both having the Radiance sealed within themself yet manifesting emotions due to time with their father, was doomed to fail at sealing the moth tribe’s forsaken god. Because of this, The Hollow Knight, too, became infected by the infection.
But hey! It’s not too bad outside of losing your individuality and will, as the infection is known to increase the power of beings it resides within. Along with this, the Hollow Knight gained the ability to unleash the infection within themself as projectiles of orange liquid. This infection can even temporarily control the Hollow Knight to lift it into the air before making it slam into the ground over and over again. While the infection is a potent power, The Hollow Knight still retains aspects of their will instilled and thus fights against it; The battle against the infection is likely what caused them to lose their left arm.
Divine Flame Pillar
Outside of manifesting properties of the infection in its natural liquid state, The Hollow Knight possesses the unique ability to create gigantic energy-like pillars of the infection that are also wrapped in similarly energy-like aspects of the VOID. Outside of the insanely raw name, this attack is likely one of the Hollow Knight’s strongest due to the deadly infectious properties of both the infection and void.
Knight Artorias
Lord Soul Fragment
As a person who was not a descendant of the Furtive Pygmy, Artorias likely instead fell into the group of people known simply as Lords. These lords were not “victims” to the Darksign as Gwyn believed but rather gained a different power altogether from newfound Lord Souls. Lord Souls are incredibly powerful objects that grant immense power to whomever wields them. As one of Gwyn’s four knights, Artorias was personally given a fragment of his King’s lord soul. Not much is directly explained about what the Lord Souls accomplish for their users outside of being a vague power boost, but we can likely infer that they also grant their users some form of Immortality, as Gwyn managed to live for thousands of years and Artorias, while corrupted, managed to live a thousand.
Magic
While Artorias doesn’t show off too many fancy spells due to the fact he’s lost his sanity, we do know Artorias was capable of utilizing an incredibly powerful form of protection magic. His greatshield, given to his companion, Sif, was charged with a unique spell that protected the Wolf from the Abyss and came with 100% resistance against all forms of Status Effects.
The Abyss
Born from a separate dimension carved by the Father of Darkness, Manus, the abyss is a violent and infectious substance that corrupted Artorias once he confronted Manus alongside Sif. Due to his failure, the Knight drowns in the Abyss, but through his thousand-year suffering, he manages to learn to use it to his advantage. The abyss is a volatile material, said to be incredibly toxic to humans. To use this power, Artorias likely draws upon dark sorceries that are empowered by his emotions, likely his self-loathing and rage, and his humanity.
In combat, Artorias can harness the dark to attack his foes. He can coat the ground in sludge made of dark, and he naturally coats the ground in the darkness from the Abyss as he moves. His most unique move, however, is his ability to indulge in the abyss fully: By drawing in and absorbing the abyss, Artorias can then amplify his current attributes to become much faster and stronger.
Resistances
Hollow Knight
Soul Manipulation: Vessels lack a soul entirely, which is whole reason why they can be soul sucking vampires in the first place.
Disease Manipulation: Considering that the Hollow Knight is composed of void and is also technically a dead child reanimated by it, it would be complicated to infect them unless you’re a giant moth god that lives in people’s heads.
Knight Artorias
Soul Manipulation: Artorias was famous for fighting off Darkwraiths, who possessed the ability to steal souls.
Poison/Bleeding: Immune to all Status Effects used by the Chosen Undead.
Forms
Hollow Knight
Shade
Each of us leaves an imprint of something when we die. A stain on the world. As menitoned previously, beings made of void are malleable and can take any damn shape they please. Like their siblings, the Hollow Knight possesses something called a “Shade.” This shade is the Hollow Knight free of the infection and physical body and existing purely as void. The Hollow Knight’s shade isn’t too special: Like other shades, they are able to traverse dimensions to enter the Radiance’s dream world, however, it is noteworthy that the Hollow Knight’s shade is capable of regeneration to some degree, considering they grew back their lost arm.
Interestingly, vessels who have been corrupted by the infection don’t actually leave behind Shades once their physical body are destroyed, and it’s likely the Hollow Knight follows this same logic considering they’re basically patient 0 for the Infection.
Knight Artorias
Corpse
Yeah, so this guy is doomed to fail and die no matter what due to the time paradox he lives under lol.
Feats
Hollow Knight
Overall
The first vessel to escape the Abyss.
Heavily implied to have completed the Path of Pain.
Endured the Pale King’s training and rose to a prime form.
Managed to seal the Radiance within themself for some time.
Assisted in defeating the Radiance along with the Knight.
Deemed a Mighty God by the Godseekers.
Power
[Pure Vessel] shattered their armor with ease
[Pure Vessel] Capable of dealing two masks of damage.
[Infected] Shattered their armor. . . again and chains.
[Shade] Tore open the Radiance’s face. Check Clarifications Segment for more info
Speed
[Pure Vessel and Infected] Capable of dashing across their arena.
Kept up with the Knight even while infected and missing an arm.
Durability
Endured the Infection even after losing an arm.
[Pure Vessel and Infected] Endured multiple hits from the Knight.
Survived stabbing themselves multiple times throughout their fight with the Knight.
Knight Artorias
Overall
One of Gwyn’s four legendary Knights.
Assisted in slaying the Dragons
Granted the title of Abysswalker and helped keep the Abyss at bay for an age.
Protected Sif from Manus in his final moments of Sanity.
Killed Darkwraiths for 1,000 years after becoming corrupted.
Inspired a wave of Abyss Walkers centuries after his death.
Power
Speed
Capable of dashing a great distance in a single thrust [As seen above]
Kept up with the Chosen Undead even while corrupted and with a broken arm
Durability
Managed to survive his encounter with Manus.
Endured multiple hits from the Chosen Undead.
Scaling
Hollow Knight
Various bosses
Considering that the Hollow Knight was raised in the White Palace to become the strongest they could possibly be, it’s very likely that the Hollow Knight, both in their Pure Vessel State and then after having their body enhanced by the infection-Should scale to many of the “normal” bugs found across Hallownest.
Mantis Lords move so fast that they vanish from sight. (Vaguely Subsonic)
False Knight was strong enough to cave in a segment of his boss arena. (0.49 Tons of TNT)
Royal Bugs
Similarly, the training the Hollow Knight went through likely means, at the very least, it is on par with some of the stronger bugs found around Hallownest.
Hornet. . .
Grimm. . .
Is Connected to the Fraudheart, which created a vaguely sized Nightmare Realm (Not even close to Uni)
The Knight
The very sibling that the Hollow Knight chose to abandon after rising out of the Abyss. The Knight is a mighty vessel despite not receiving the same training the Hollow Knight did. Considering the Hollow Knight manages to do battle against the Knight both while infected and in its Pure Vessel form, it’s likely they should be somewhat on par with the Knight’s power. Check clarifications segment for more info.
Can propel themself by striking things below with their nail.
The Knight is capable of swinging their nail in tandem with electricity. (Mach 44.77 - 137.3)
Dodges the Crystal Guardian’s lasers. (Mach 43,701.52 or 5% c)
Moves in tandem with The Radiance’s beams of light. (Mach 22,724.79 or 2% c)
Knight Artorias
Various demons.
The world of Dark Souls is filled with demons, all thanks to the worst runback in FromSoft history: The Bed of Chaos. Considering Artorias was an unrivaled Knight with a greatsword, and given a portion of Gwyn’s own Lord Soul, he likely should scale to multiple members of Demonkind. Artorias should also scale to the Chosen Undead, who killed PLENTY of demons in their journey.
The Asylum Demon can. . .
Swing its gigantic hammer incredibly fast. (0.02 tons of TNT - 0.09 tons of TNT/Mach 0.45 - Mach 0.9)
The Tarus Demon. . .
Can endure lava discharge from the Ceaseless Discharge. (22.94 tons of TNT)
The Capra demon. . .
Is a BITCH ASS MOTHERFUCKER.
NO, SERIOUSLY, WHO DECIDED IT WAS OKAY TO MAKE THAT TINY BOSS ARENA, THROW IN TWO DOGS, AND THEN AN ENTIRE BOSS THERE AFTER LIKE THE FIRST BOSS IN THE GAME???
The Ceaseless Discharge. . .
Released an absurd amount of lava that cooled instantly after its death. (59.14 Kilotons of TNT)
The Knights of Gwyn.
(Art by @Sathrias)
As a member of the four chosen knights elected by Gwyn and given fragments of his lord's soul, Artorias should pretty blatantly scale to his fellow knights.
Dragon Slayer Ornstein can. . .
. . . uh, slay dragons?
The Everlasting Dragons could create gigantic storms. (2.242 Gigatons of TNT - 2.826 Teratons of TNT)
Comparable to Smough, who can swing his hammer incredibly fast. (0.1 Tons of TNT - 0.4 tons of TNT/Mach 0.37 - Mach 0.74)
Hawkeye Gough can. . .
Lord’s Blade Ciaran. . .
Wanted Artorias really, REALLY badly.
Succeeded in a male-dominated field.
She-Okay, look, she does like nothing in the game.
Artorias The Abysswalker can. . .
Can flin-Ay wait a minute
The Chosen Undead.
The true warrior behind the Legend of Artorias is none other than the Chosen Undead! But before they could defeat Manus, they first needed to free Artorias from his suffering. Despite missing a useable arm and losing his mind, Artorias still put up a good fight and should scale partially to the Chosen Undead! Check clarifications segment for more info.
Can create large explosions with Pyromancy spells. (4 tons of TNT)
Can create large plumes of flame with Pyromancy. (11 tons of TNT)
Fast enough to dodge Sen Fortress’s bolt traps (Mach 1.2 - Mach 2.3)
Comparable to the Ashen One, another linker of the flame
The Ashen One can avoid beams of light (Mach 27,531.96 or 3.15% c)
The Ashen One can avoid beams of light: Death Battle version (Mach 183,546.40 or 21% C)
Weaknesses
Hollow Knight
Although the Hollow Knight is a powerful warrior, they are disabled, lacking an arm due to the infection now fully appearing on their body. This limits their abilities and restricts them from using certain attacks and sword fighting at the same time, although they are still able to parry attacks. The greater weakness the Hollow Knight possesses is that they want to die really REALLY badly. Multiple times throughout the fight with the Knight, the Hollow Knight will stop what they are doing and stab themselves multiple times repeatedly.
Furthermore, the Hollow Knight is battling the infection constantly, and there is a high likelihood of it temporarily taking over to do battle using its body like a grotesque mech suit. Outside of that, the Hollow Knight’s soul abilities are limited and rely on it hitting its opponent to siphon soul from it.
Knight Artorias
(Art by MenasLG)
Artorias doesn’t bore many weaknesses besides his sluggish nature due to his gargantuan sword and his broken left arm. One potential weakness is that Artorias, like his other high ranking Knights, is likely a bit TOO cocky. Artorias not only overestimated his own abilities when he attempted to kill the Four Kings, and then fatally overestimated them when he went after Manus, but generally speaking, he’s arrogant to a degree which can be seen when he mistakes Arkon for a Darkwraith despite personally saving the man during the war against the dragons.
A Couple of clarifications.
Can Hollow Knight still use Soul?
As you probably know if you played Hollow Knight (the game, not the—jeez, hopefully not the guy), THE Hollow Knight does not use a single soul attack in their boss fight against the Knight. While this could be explained away as a gameplay balance and the fact that the Pure Vessel was released almost a year after the game dropped, there is actually a better lore reason to justify giving the Hollow Knight these abilities!
They ran out of soul. Vessels cannot naturally generate soul due to the fact they are corpses reanimated by the void rather than soul and instead need to strike enemies to siphon some of their soul to unleash spells and heal. The Hollow Knight is no stranger to this rule and likely ran out of soul during their struggles against the Radiance while in their seal. Then, the first person they get to fight is the Knight, who lacks any soul altogether. But doesn’t the Hollow Knight AND Pure Vessel give off soul during their boss fights? Now, this can be explained by gameplay mechanics, and for the Hollow Knight, that is the only solid explanation. As for the Pure Vessel, it could be likely that the Knight is siphoning off their stored-up soul energy or hitting them via their armor! Other void beings like Kingsmould release soul to the player; even though they are pure void beings, their ivory armor is not! Since the Hollow Knight wears the same kind of armor, this is very likely the reason for why these enemies give off soul in-universe.
Anyways, with that out of the way, considering other infected beings like the Soul Master and. . . well, really every being in the Soul Sanctum can still use soul spells, The Hollow Knight should be able to do the same.
How high do the Hollow Knight and Artorias actually scale?
At first, it may seem like a no-brainer to automatically scale the Hollow Knight and Artorias to the absolute peaks of their verse, but upon further inspection, this doesn’t REALLY hold up. Starting with Artorias since his scaling is actually important (More on this in a second). Artorias scaling to Lord Soul wielders and those comparable like the Chosen Undead makes no sense at all. Firstly, Artorias merely possesses a FRAGMENT of Gwyn’s own Lord Soul, like his other Knights, which makes it already questionable to suggest he’s on that same level of power as one with a full Lord Soul. Secondly, Artorias infamously could not defeat the Four Kings or Manus! Which the Chosen Undead did. Once again, it’s painted that Artorias is just not on the level of these characters. . . but what about “prime” Artorias? Well, simply Prime Artorias might unironically be weaker than current Artorias. In the Age of Fire comic, we see clearly that Artorias is STRONG, but he completely ignores his shield and opts mostly to utilize his Greatsword, which makes sense, considering his legendary skill. The only drawback Artorias got from being corrupted was losing an arm and losing his mind; he should still realistically be at the same level of power, if not STRONGER, since he can then amplify himself with the abyss. Even with this power amp, he’s still not much for the Chosen Undead, Manus, or other high tiers that would scale to the first flame. Thus, it’s unreasonable to suggest that Artorias could be on that level of power.
Speed, on the other hand, has some leeway. While Artorias can’t keep up in terms of sheer power with his soul to other First Flame scalers, he should realistically be able to keep up in speed, considering he fights in tandem with the Chosen Undead in their fight. The Chosen Undead would then be as fast as our First Flame scalers, like the Ashen One from Dark Souls 3. Furthermore, Artorias can, again, amplify his speed with the abyss, so this scaling should be pretty solid.
Now for the insect. . . Similarly, it doesn’t make alot of sense for The Hollow Knight to be on par with some absurd higher being like the Nightmare Heart or the Radiance. The Radiance is a bit more obvious on why HK shouldn’t scale, considering she easily overpowers them to spread the infection and even causes them to lose an arm. But what about the fact they managed to tear open the Radiance’s face as a Shade and can do two masks of damage? Like other Higher Being bosses? Okay, well firstly, the ENRAGED GUARDIAN can also do two masks damage, so just in case you’re ready to have some #UncomfortableConversations about Star Level Crystal Guardian, my DMs are wide open. Secondly, the Hollow Knight only managed to tear open the Radiance’s face after she already went through a LENGTHY battle with the Knight where she was progressively getting weaker due to its sheer power.
To be honest, though, it’s not like the Hollow Knight would have anything to scale to due to the sheer vagueness of the Dream Realm’s size and if anyone could even scale to it. Dreams have been referred to as eternal, yes, but that is concerning how long they last. In context, the Seer’s quote is directly contrasting them to how Kingdoms come and pass, but dreams do NOT. This is pretty obviously a time-based eternal and not a space-based eternal. The “Sun-level” Radiance stuff also falls apart due to a multitude of reasons, like sizes not matching up, and everything describing the Radiance as such clearly being a metaphor. Although, like Artorias, the Hollow Knight should be able to keep up in terms of speed with the Knight. Especially since some of the Knight’s best feats come from our totally high-tier Crystal Guardian.
With all this covered, both the Hollow Knight and Artorias should scale to most of the verse, except for the High tiers.
Void and the Abyss
Before we get into the Verdict, there is a SLIGHT potential power equalizer we need to cover, that being the Void and the Abyss. Considering that both sources originate from the “darkness.” are corrosive and corruptive in nature, and come in both liquid and energy forms, they seem pretty darn similar. Despite this, there is one MAJOR difference between the Void and the Abyss, and that is emotions. The Void is, hehehehe, VOID of emotions and relies instead on a hive mind that attacks things that aren’t part of it. The Abyss, on the other hand, is born directly from Manus’s sheer rage at losing his special little pendant, and the Abyss itself runs directly on not only negative emotions but a very likely a being’s humanity, considering the Abyss only came into form due to Manus’s absurd amount of humanity. In contrast, the Void can exist on its own, without any form, and even traverse the dimensions into mental planes like the Dream Realm.
Due to this difference in origin and how it sustains itself, I will NOT be equalizing the Hollow Knight’s void abilities and Artorias’s Dark sorceries because. . . well, it doesn’t really make sense, but also because it makes this next part alot more fun!
Verdict
(Pure Vessel art from Pixiv)
Stats
The stats for both characters are pretty blatant since both of them rely on scaling to the rest of their respective verses. For the Hollow Knight, they should scale to both the False Knight and Hornet, each of whom can reach building levels of power. Artorias, on the other hand, can do the same by scaling to the Chosen Undead’s pyromancy spells. At their strongest from just these comparisons, the Hollow Knight’s AP would be at 1.72 tons of TNT, while Artorias can go as high as 11 tons, making him about 6x STRONGER! But wait!!! It can get even worse. The absolute highest the Hollow Knight peaks at is, again, their sister’s feat, but you could argue they could scale to the Pale King. The Pale King was capable of transporting his entire white palace to the Dreamworld, which you could argue to get around City block levels of power. While this is a dubious scale, considering the aforementioned points of the Hollow Knight not scaling to Higher Beings, you could also argue that the Pale King wouldn’t be as physically imposing as the rest due to his small size and new form. Either way, this will be used temporarily to simply make a point. At most, this feat could potentially be around 100 tons of TNT, but is very likely not, due to the amount of material moved from the physical world to the Dream realm. Either way, this doesn’t matter much since Artorias should scale to the Everlasting Dragons. The Dragons are very powerful beings and can create entire storms, either with their own abilities or through the bells they empower. At its MAXIMUM level, this would make Artorias’ AP 2.82 TERATONS OF TNT. This makes Artorias about 28,261,032,504.7x STRONGER, and this is using a questionable feat that the Hollow Knight would questionably scale to. This is all without mentioning the fact that Artorias can actively make himself stronger via absorbing the abyss, which means the gap might even be BIGGER.
So Artorias is undoubtably ridiculously stronger to the point they could annihilate the Hollow Knight anytime their blades clash, but could the Hollow Knight avoid this via speed? Off the bat, the Hollow Knight seems alot faster scaling to the Knight who swings in tandem with electricity. This, at its highest, would put the Hollow Knight around Mach 137. Not too bad, and it definitely overpowers all of Artorias’s lower-end speed feats, as the highest he can get to is a mere Mach 1.2 by scaling to Hawkeye Kalameet’s arrow speed. But both characters can reach relativistic ends by scaling to their game’s protagonists. The Knight has two useful ends, one reaching 2%c and a much better feat reaching 5%c, and the Hollow Knight, at first glance, has Artorias beat out as he scales to the Ashen One’s lower end of 3.15%c. . . but that’s just the low end. Using DEATH BATTLE’s calc for another similar light dodging feat, this would put Artorias at 21%c, or 4.2x faster than the Hollow Knight. Even comparing their low ends of 2% and 3.15% would make Artorias faster, but obviously to a negligible level.
Overall, the Hollow Knight is not taking a single stat. Even without stats, Hollow Knight characters have a ton of abilities, so can the Hollow Knight squeeze by through that?
Arsenal & Abilities
Off the bat, it’s already obvious the Hollow Knight has Artorias beat when it comes to sheer versaility. They can teleport, shapeshift, heal themselves, unleash projectiles, summon blades, and even potentially infect Artorias with either the void or infection. However, Artorias makes up for his lack in arsenal via counters. Let’s go over the Hollow Knight’s soul abilities first! While they are useful, especially focus as it can both serve as a powerful healing and AOE attack, it still requires soul which means the Hollow Knight needs to siphon it from Artorias which is going to be a problem since, not only is approaching Artorias at close range dangerous due to his superior stats, but also because Artorias likely resists any manner of soul stealing due to his multiple battles against Darkwraiths whom possess not only the ability to siphon soul, but completely STEAL a person’s soul. This means that over time, the Hollow Knight is going to lose access to their soul abilities and will instead need to use the infection, which may be countered via Artorias’ magic.
Remember his ability to resist poisons? While the Infection isn’t a direct 1:1 of Dark Soul’s poisons, it can be noted to be similar to a status effect, which Artorias could resist completely with his spells, as he does so with his shield. The question is if he can even do this in the first place, considering he fell to Manus’s corruption. While the Void and the Abyss aren’t similar, the Infection and Abyss actually are! They’re both infectious and corrosive sources of emotion-driven power sporuting from a being in an alternate dimension that rely on physical matter! Filling a lot of checks. While this doesn’t mean Artorias could absorb the infection like he does with the abyss, this does mean he should be vulnerable to its infectious properties. Although Artorias’ shield magic did resist the powers of the abyss, it’s dubious to suggest it would do the same to the infection. It’s even MORE dubious to say his pendant could negate the Hollow Knight’s infection since the pendant is specifically linked to Manus and his abilities.
Despite all of this siding with the Hollow Knight, the actual issue here is that the infection isn’t going to be doing much. Sure, it may be able to corrupt Artorias, but the amount of time it takes the infection to actually work isn’t exactly explained. Luckily, the Hollow Knight has TWO infectious abilities via their Divine Flame Pillar attack. Since Void and the Abyss aren’t similar enough to equalize, this means that Artorias would be vulnerable to its corrosive properties, although there is the same problem of there being a vague time on how long this infection takes to operate. Characters like the Tower of Love assistant and the Lighthouse Keeper appear to have been infected over time due to prolonged exposure, but this could be argued against since they weren’t being directly attacked with the void, while the Hollow Knight would directly be attacking him with it.
So the Hollow Knight MAY be able to win by playing keep away and continuing to assault Artorias from afar with their ranged abilities that use infection and void. Can they actually do that? Considering the fact they are already an agile fighter that can teleport, the Hollow Knight does have a very solid chance to do this exact thing if not for one issue: The infection. The infection is constantly fighting for control over the Hollow Knight’s body, which is BAD because the infection is incredibly violent; Infected bugs attack anything that isn’t infected, similar to the void, and even to a more self-sacrificing nature, considering some infected bugs detonate themselves to harm their opponent. This ties into the Hollow Knight as the infection can take charge of their body, rising them into the air before slamming down over and over again.
Why is this a problem? Well, because after doing so, the Hollow Knight is left vulnerable. Artorias is already faster, and considering he can dash across an arena or flip over, this means he could easily execute this opening and pop the Hollow Knight’s mask right open. Generally, while keep-away and waiting for one of the infections to kick in is a viable strategy, the Hollow Knight, unfortunately, is fighting two wars at the same time: One against Artorias’ physical might and one against the Infection. It is more likely that the Hollow Knight is going to slip up and give in to the infection, and that will leave them open for the single attack that Artorias needs to kill them.
But that’s only their physical body. As we’ve covered, every vessel has a shade form they can go into once their physical forms are destroyed. While it is questionable if the Hollow Knight could manifest as a shade in the physical world, due to the fact we see the Broken Vessel be unable to, let’s play this idea anyways because as a Shade, the Hollow Knight could continously attack Artorias with void spells and infect him that way. . . if not only for the fact that Artorias has shown the ability to be able to interact with spirits like shades with his swords. Plus, Artorias has some surprising agility from his flipping attacks, so even the shade’s ability to float and fly might be hindered here.
Overall, the Hollow Knight’s abilities just take way too long to actually be able to put Artorias down for good, while Artorias can simply blast through all of their efforts with relative ease. Even if the infection might not put them down, there are two more problems. . .
Tertiary Factors
Similar to their arsenals and stats, we can easily draw some simple lines here. First, we know that Artorias is likely much older, more experienced, and even more skilled. Time in Hollow Knight is vague, and we can’t use the Hollow Knight’s size as a reference point, considering they are the same age as the very tiny Knight. Meanwhile, Artorias has lived for a thousand years and was nearly constantly fighting during those years. This also makes him more skilled as, unlike the Hollow Knight, Artorias was actually fighting people with swords instead of training with a nail to improve their bodies. The Hollow Knight can parry and keep up with the Knight, who did train under nailmasters, but Artorias has been labeled as unparalleled in skill with a Greatsword and proves it, considering how easily he beats down Silver Knight Arkon with just it in his hands.
Artorias’s willpower is something constantly praised about whenever he appears and something even temporarily seen in his introduction cutscene during his boss fight before the Abyss claws back at him. While the Hollow Knight has a similar level of willpower, their will does not call for them to fight but rather to kill themselves. This is obviously detrimental in a fight to the death since they’d be actively aiding Artorias in his efforts. Furthermore, not only is the Hollow Knight’s psyche poor, but their weapons are as well. Unlike Artorias, whose corrupted blade is still mighty after so many decades, the Hollow Knight’s nail is chipped and breaking. Considering Artorias’ superior strength, he may even be able to shatter the nai-Why does this sound strikingly familiar?
Conclusion
Advantages:
The infection and void could likely infect Artorias. . .
Far superior range
More versatile
Teleportation allows them to play keep-away for a time.
Can continue the battle as a shade. . .
Actually walked through the Abyss and escaped it
Disadvantages:
MUCH weaker.
Slower.
Can’t absorb Artorias’ soul.
Actively wants to die and thus is likely not to give it their all
Infection may ruin their attempts to win.
Inferior weaponry.
. . . Shade form is vulnerable to Artorias’ greatsword.
. . . But it takes too long to succeed.
Daddy issues.
"All of you. . . forgive me. For have I availed you nothing."
Advantages:
ABSURDLY stronger
Faster
Far more experienced
More Skilled.
Magic may allow him to resist the infection or abyss. . .
Superior Willpower
Superior arsenal.
Has a very cool dog
Disadvantages:
Far less versatile.
. . . but he’s unlikely to use it, and it’s unlikely to work.
Canonically the biggest fraud in the entire Souls Series.
His game’s janky as fuck.
The Hollow Knight was undoubtedly a very tricky opponent, especially considering they were born of god, void and corrupted by the light, but Artorias could match their darkness with his own. Thanks to his superior strength and speed, his better weaponry and tools, and the fact that he could resist the Hollow Knight’s best attempts until he got an opening, he made it so that the Hollow Knight could be pure once more in death. The winner of this Death Battle is Artorias, the Abysswalker.
Next time
Creates one actual next time
Dies
Firstly, THANK YOU EVERYONE, for taking time out of your day to read this blog! I hope all the information and my arguments came out nicely. If you notice anything wrong or any errors, please feel free to mention them so I can do better next time or edit this blog so as not to spread blatant misinformation, especially on the Dark Souls side of things. Anyways
After creating four blogs I have come to a realization. . . these are TIME CONSUMING GOD DAMN!!! Interest in creating a fifth blog isn’t really there, especially in any matchups at the moment. Furthermore, I’m interested in pursuing some personal writing projects, so I won’t leave any false announcements for a future blog down the line! Because of this, the Odd’s Goffy Little Versus Corner is going on an indefinite hiatus for now, but I’ll likely pop back up to drop another simple solo blog in the future! With all that said, have a great day, everyone! Peace and Love!
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