1 : The Branded Swordsman
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Guts, renowned as the \"Black Swordsman\", is a former mercenary and branded wanderer who travels the world in a constant internal struggle between pursuing his own ends and upholding his attachments to those dear to him.
Under Gambino's tutelage, Guts began honing his swordsmanship at six years of age, and joined the mercenary's band three years later, looking up to his leader as a father figure of sorts. On the night following Guts' first skirmish, a mercenary named Donovan ambushed and raped him in his tent, revealing he bought the boy for a night from Gambino. In a following skirmish, the young mercenary isolated Donovan and eliminated him, refusing to believe the man's claim from the previous night.[24]
During the siege of a military garrison defended by the Band of the Falcon, Guts joins the fray alongside a mercenary band and narrowly defeats an enemy leader named Bazuso, lowering the enemy's morale and allowing for the fort's capture.[25] In his travels, he is attacked by Band of the Falcon mercenaries seeking to claim his reward and exact revenge for his earlier interference. He easily dispatches most of them until he is met by Griffith, who quickly incapacitates the swordsman and has him brought to the band's encampment.[27]
Waking several days later, Guts is given by Griffith the option to join the band, though he promptly refuses, instead opting to challenge Griffith to a duel. He stipulates that the White Falcon can lay claim to him in the advent of defeating him in combat. Harboring a vested interest in Guts, Griffith agrees and the two engage in a sensational battle, with the White Falcon ultimately defeating the swordsman and enlisting him as a member of the Band of the Falcon.[28]
Petrified by Zodd's transformation and completely outclassed, Guts is thrashed around and nearly crushed by the apostle, before Griffith and Band of the Falcon reinforcements intervene. When Griffith comes to Guts' aid, Zodd blocks the two's path of escape, forcing them to execute a pincer movement on the apostle, in which both of them deal substantial damage to the demon. In retaliation, Zodd tail whips Griffith into a column, though he immediately ceases his onslaught upon sighting Griffith's Crimson Beherit. The beast leaves Guts with a prophecy, warning the swordsman of an inescapable death that shall befall him should Griffith's dream ever collapse, before flying off.[30]
During the Autumn Hunt in Wyndham after their return, the Band of the Falcon acts as the king of Midland's guard in place of General Julius' White Dragon Knights. In midst of the hunt, Griffith is shot by a stray arrow, but avoids injury due to his beherit taking the brunt of the blow. On a night sometime after, Griffith, having deduced Julius as the culprit behind the murder attempt, asks Guts to kill the general in retaliation. The swordsman invades Julius' manor in the dark of night and swiftly eliminates his target. When the door to general's room opens, Guts, assuming it to be a guard, pierces through in advance, killing Julius' son, Adonis.[31] With the guards alerted, a distraught Guts battles his way off the premises and escapes through the Wyndham sewers.
Roughly a year following his departure, Guts enters a combat tournament hosted by a Midland noble and offers to fight a foreigner named Silat, proposing he would provide the tourney winner with better competition, to which the man accepts. Evading the rapid strikes of his opponent, Guts is able to overpower Silat with relative ease and win the bout. The amazed tournament host offers Guts a job while alluding to the Band of the Falcon's continued activity with Casca as their new leader, much to the swordsman's surprise.[42]
Fighting their way through a wave of alerted soldiers, the rescue team is able to reenter the sewers, thwart an ambush by Bakiraka assassins sent to kill Griffith, and escape Wyndham to a farm outside the city.[46] En route to the Midland border, the group realizes they are being pursued by the dreaded Black Dog Knights. Though their laid traps fail to deter the Dogs, the rescue team eventually rejoins another Band of the Falcon unit and combats their pursuers, at which point Guts clashes with the Black Dogs' apostle leader, Wyald. Excited by his battle with the swordsman, Wyald transforms into his monstrous released form, though after a fierce engagement, Guts is able to best and temporarily incapacitate the beast. Wyald rises again, however, grabbing a defenseless Griffith in retaliation and dealing a critical blow to the band's morale by revealing the full extent of the ravaged man's grievous injuries. The dying, desperate apostle demands that Griffith summon the \"God Hand\", but to his dismay observes that Griffith is no longer in possession of the Crimson Beherit, and so he resolves to kill the White Falcon. In an abrupt intervention, Zodd tears Wyald in two and then tells Griffith that his beherit will soon return to him before flying off.[47]
For two years, Guts continues on his warpath against demonkind, becoming renowned as the \"Black Swordsman\" in his hunt for apostles. He eventually makes his way to the town of Koka, killing an unidentified female apostle one night while en route. Upon arriving in the town, he immediately makes his presence known by killing several Koka thugs in a tavern, leaving but one victim alive to send word of his approach: \"The Black Swordsman has come.\" He also unintentionally makes an invaluable ally by freeing an elf named Puck, who in return frees and heals the swordsman when he is caught and imprisoned in a Koka jail. Receiving word of the Black Swordsman's presence, the bloodthirsty Snake Lord rides through Koka in search of his aggressor, burning down everything in his path and leaving a trail of corpses in his wake. Guts eventually intercepts and does fierce battle with the Snake Lord, eventually incapacitating the apostle and interrogating him for the God Hand's whereabouts before leaving him to burn to cinders.[1]
Sometime later, during the trialing of supposed heretics in another municipality, Guts makes his presence known to a Slug Count apostle serving as ruler of the area. The alerted town guards, led by Zondark, pursue Guts, though he easily dispatches them and disfigures their commander, before escaping to a lab with the help of a diminutive man named Vargas. Inside, Vargas informs the swordsman of a secret passage into the Count's castle, and reveals the beherit which he stole from the apostle seven years prior. They are soon ambushed by a possessed Zondark, who ruins the lab in a fierce bout with Guts and forces them to flee again. Guts eventually parts ways with Vargas, but not before taking the beherit in the man's possession for himself.[54]
Following the later capture and execution of Vargas by the Count, Guts vows to succeed where his late accomplice could not, before using the secret passage to infiltrate the Count's castle. Storming the premises, Guts finishes off the pseudo-apostle Zondark and fights his way toward the Count's quarters, where the apostle assumes his massive slug-like released form. He is initially overpowered by the transformed Slug Count, but with Puck's intervention and the swordsman's hostage-taking of the Count's daughter, Theresia, Guts is able to deal a crippling blow to the abstracted apostle with his cannon arm. Fearing for his life, the Count manages to activate his returned beherit (dropped by Guts during their battle) and summons the God Hand.[55]
The sight of Femto immediately enrages Guts, spurring him to attack his nemesis, though his assault ends in vain after Femto casually repels him. After the Count fails to offer his daughter as sacrifice, he is dragged by lost souls into the Abyss, and so too is Guts as one branded, although the swordsman manages to free himself with a blast from his cannon arm as the temporal junction ends. Returned to the Physical World, Guts prevents a suicidal Theresia from falling to her death. He sows within her hatred directed toward himself, for his being the primary reason for the loss of her father, and thus the loss of all she has ever known; Theresia declares revenge on the swordsman, her will to die extinguished. Guts nonchalantly accepts her declaration and takes his leave; however, upon closer inspection, Puck observes that the typically-stoic swordsman is noticeably upset by the declaration.[56]
Guts is taken to a Holy Iron Chain Knights encampment, where Farnese attempts to force a confession from him through interrogation, though he remains unmoved and only mocks her hollow religious devotion. Later during the night, Puck frees him from his cage and constraints, allowing the swordsman to reacquire his gear, take Farnese hostage, and escape the encampment. Naturally, he is pursued by spirits drawn by his brand, the \"miraculous\" nature of which he uses to further deride and shake Farnese's beliefs. When Farnese runs off and finds herself at the mercy of a possessed, lustful horse, Guts is reminded of Casca's rape during the Eclipse, and is then filled with enough pure rage to combat the possessed animals until morning. Before dawn, Guts is harassed by a possessed, bared Farnese before the spirit compelling her eventually relinquishes its hold at sunrise. Serpico soon arrives at their location and, after a brief exhibition with Guts, leaves with his charge.[62]
As he makes his escape across a cliff side, his path is blocked by Serpico, who, having anticipated Guts' approach, uses the precarious situation to his advantage and makes an attempt on the inhibited swordsman's life. Serpico underestimates the Black Swordsman's sheer reflexes and brawn, as Guts grabs and shatters his assailant's blade, forcing the weaponless herald to flee. Afterward rendezvousing with Isidro, he learns the young thief failed in escorting Casca, having allowed the Holy Iron Chain Knights to capture her during their escape.[66]
Having returned to Albion, Guts i