Quick answer: Stay at sword range so his hook can’t drag you in, parry his blue-flash swings, dodge the red-flash cleaver sweep, and hit back only in short bursts right after a parry.
The Butcher is a large elite enemy in Phantom Blade Zero’s Crimson Forest: a fat, masked brute with a meat hook and a cleaver who punishes both greedy attacks and cautious distance. The fight shown here took about 100 seconds.
Where to find the Butcher
The first Butcher stands on the trail southwest of the Outlaw Trap bell, the Crimson Forest’s second bell after the Crane Bell. Follow that trail away from the Outlaw Trap bell and it leads straight to him.
He isn’t a boss. No boss bar appears along the bottom of the screen; instead, a short health bar sits over his head. The first Butcher has 7,580 health.
A second Butcher is stationed in the lower-level butcher’s yard beneath the Outlaw Trap bell, with hounds roaming around it. In the yard the hounds are the first threat: charging straight at that Butcher lets three hounds bring you down before you reach him, so clear the hounds first. Every other enemy type is in the full enemy list.
How to reach the second Butcher’s yard
A Sick Dog patrols the yard near the walkway’s end and joins a Butcher fight you start from that spot. On PATHBREAKER, each bite takes over a tenth of your health bar. Clear all hounds near the yard before taking on the Butcher at full health, and stay clear of the pit edge.
The Butcher’s attacks and tells
He wields a hefty cleaver and a curved iron meat hook and links them in combos, and some strings go on for many hits. As with all enemies, a flash precedes each attack, and its color tells you how to respond. The game’s own loading tip sums it up: “Parry blue and dodge red. Keep this in mind and you’ll go far.”
| Tell | What it means | Your answer |
|---|---|---|
| Blue flash | Parryable swing | Stance (Right Mouse) |
| Red flash | Cannot be blocked | Dodge (Shift) |
His red-flash attack is a wide cleaver sweep that leaves a red arc trail around him. Don’t try to block it.
His codex entry, listed under “Butcher”, spells out the rest of his kit:
“Their iron hooks drag distant enemies within reach of their cleavers, while the filth they vomit forms a poisonous miasma around them. When they begin gorging on chunks of meat, they are restoring their strength for another murderous assault.”
In practice, that leaves you with three problems:
- Backing off to range isn’t safe, because the hook pulls you back in.
- Standing close slowly drains your health through the miasma, a small but steady loss.
- Gorging on meat means he’s recovering, which gives you an opening.
How to beat the Butcher
On PC, the default bindings are Left Mouse for Light Attack, F for Sha-Chi Attack, Right Mouse for Stance (block and parry), and Shift for Dodge.
Never start a long string the moment one of his combos ends. His next attack is often already winding up, and that timing is where the heaviest hit of the fight landed.
Butcher difficulty: WAYFARER vs. PATHBREAKER
The fight shown here was won on WAYFARER, an easier difficulty than PATHBREAKER. Attempts on PATHBREAKER ended in death: his long combos stacked with the miasma drain burned through every heal. If he walls you there, switching to WAYFARER is a valid way past him (see the difficulty modes).
Butcher reward and how you know he’s down
The Butcher collapses when the health bar over his head runs out.
The Remnant Dust counter in the top-right corner then shows “+ 360”, so the kill pays 360 Remnant Dust. No item dropped on this kill.
