The Blood of Dawnwalker: How to Beat the Beast of St. Teotim’s

The Beast of St. Teotim’s is the boss waiting behind the belltower doors during the What Hunts the Night quest in The Blood of Dawnwalker, and it opens the fight the moment you pull the doors open. It hits hard, has a large health pool, and recovers from its own swings fast enough that most deaths come from trying to squeeze in one extra hit.

Quick answer: Dodge sideways whenever the beast leaps or shows a skull icon, only counterattack after a perfect block, spend your active sword abilities on those openings, then switch to claws to close out the last stretch of its health bar.

Where the Beast of St. Teotim’s fight starts

What Hunts the Night begins right after Where Loyalty Lies wraps up. You head back into the city, drop into the cellar of Crake’s house, and talk to him to formally start the quest. The fight itself is gated behind nightfall.

Once night arrives, Sara joins you, and the three of you investigate the scouts’ deaths in the churchyard. Following the stains on the ground leads to the belltower doors. Opening them triggers the encounter immediately, so make sure your healing items and abilities are ready before you interact with the door.

Read the attack indicators: block or dodge

The beast telegraphs everything through the same indicator system the rest of the game uses, and it leans heavily on the unblockable side. Getting this one distinction right is most of the fight.

Indicator	What to do
Skull icon	Unblockable. Dodge or step fully out of range — your guard will not save you.
Shield icon	Blockable or parryable. Hold your block and aim for a perfect block to open a counter window.
Leaping attack	Dodge to the side rather than backward. Backing up rarely creates enough distance.

The important quirk is recovery. Even after a clean perfect block, the beast repositions and swings again quickly, so treat your counter window as a single short combo rather than a free damage phase. Land one or two hits, then reset your guard.

Boss health bar for The Beast of St. Teotim's as the player lands a 359 damage counterattack — The counter window after a block is short, so cash it in for one clean hit. Image: Rebel Wolves

Damage plan: sword abilities first, claws to finish

Open with the sword and spend your active abilities on the counter windows. These do far more per activation than your basic strings, and the beast’s health bar is large enough that regular swings alone drag the fight out.

Player using a sword ability on the red-marked beast as its boss health bar drops — Active sword abilities take the biggest chunks out of the boss health bar. Image: Rebel Wolves

Keep circling. The beast covers ground quickly, so stay mobile between openings instead of standing in front of it waiting for a read. Sideways movement keeps you out of the leap’s landing zone.

Swap to claws once you’re comfortable with its rhythm. Claw attacks come out faster and hit harder here, which turns short counter windows into meaningful chunks of damage rather than chip hits. This is the fastest way to burn down the back half of its health.

Close-quarters claw attack on the Beast of St. Teotim's with its boss health bar on screen — Claws trade reach for speed, which suits the short openings this boss gives you. Image: Rebel Wolves

Let the attrition play out. Individual hits land in the low hundreds, so expect a long exchange rather than a burst kill, and don’t panic if the bar moves slowly at first.

Damage number of 333 appearing as the beast's health bar sits partially depleted — The health bar comes down in steady increments rather than large spikes. Image: Rebel Wolves

Note: Sara fights alongside you here, which pulls aggro off you at useful moments. Use those seconds to heal or reposition instead of forcing extra attacks.

Why the fight goes wrong

Almost every failed attempt traces back to a small number of habits, and they are easy to correct once you spot them.

Blocking a skull-marked attack. Those swings go straight through your guard and need a dodge.
Extending your combo after a perfect block. The beast recovers fast and punishes the extra hit.
Dodging backwards out of a leap. Sideways dodges clear the attack; backwards ones often don’t.
Saving abilities for a phase that never comes. Spend charges as openings appear rather than holding them.

Multiple attempts are normal. The encounter is tuned around learning its openings, not around out-damaging it early.

How to confirm the boss is dead

You’ll know it worked without checking the health bar. The kill cuts straight into a cutscene in which Crake finds a woman still alive, and Sara comes out of the fight injured. Control returns to you afterwards with the quest tracker updated.

Two objectives appear once the scene ends, telling you to talk with Crake and to inspect the monster’s remains. A new glossary entry for Gargoyle also unlocks at the same moment, which is the clearest confirmation the encounter has fully resolved rather than reset.

Player striking the winged skeletal beast with the quest tracker and combat HUD on screen — The final blows trigger the cutscene and the Gargoyle glossary unlock. Image: Rebel Wolves

The corpse has several examinable points, and you need to work through them to pull the clue the quest is looking for. Missing one leaves the objective sitting in your journal, so sweep the whole body before moving on.

After the remains are inspected, What Hunts the Night shifts into an escape sequence. You run with Crake through an area crawling with hostile guards, fight your way to a locked gate, climb over it, and open it from the other side so he can follow. A short conversation later, Crake leads you to Mevasser, and the quest closes out once the two of them have spoken.