Escaping the Scarlet Church as Aidan Lynch means picking up everything you can swing or fire along the way. Five weapons sit inside the compound between your first fight and the door to the club, and each is tied to a specific room you pass through. Knowing where they are — and which one works on the armoured cultists — keeps you from grinding a useless blade against metal plate and dying for it.
Quick answer: Five weapons appear in the compound — a knife, the Machete, the Cleaver, the Skullcrusher and the Pistol. The blunt Skullcrusher is the only one that breaks armour; blades are for unarmoured enemies.
Every weapon in the compound and where it is
You collect these in a fixed order as the route pushes you deeper into the facility. Four are melee weapons; the Pistol is the only firearm you find in this stretch.
| Weapon | Type | Where to find it |
|---|---|---|
| Knife | Bladed | Room with a hooded man hanging by his ankles, after the Chatterer chase |
| Machete | Bladed | On the floor under the wash basin in the archive/library |
| Cleaver | Bladed | On a bathtub in the tiled washroom past the library |
| Skullcrusher | Blunt | On the saw table in the workshop beyond the shrine room |
| Pistol | Firearm | In a dying detective’s hand, behind the Room 206 security door |
Weapon locations, in the order you reach them
The knife (your first weapon)
After escaping the Chatterer, look to the left along the tiled basement passage for a green swinging door. Beyond it, a hooded man is suspended by his ankles, with a blade embedded in his body and the prompt “F Pull knife out”.
Pulling it triggers a short cutscene and drops you straight into a one-on-one fight with a masked cultist, using “LMB Attack” and “A S D Evade”. No name shows on screen for this weapon here — Aidan just calls it “some kinda blade” — but it functions as a bladed weapon.
Machete
In the archive/library beyond the secret bookshelf, first defeat the cultist stationed at the shelf. Then search the corner beneath the broken mirror: the Machete rests on the floor below the wash basin.
Tap “F Equip” to use it right away, or hold F to take it into your inventory. Its description reads: “Machete — Cuts through flesh and bones alike.” It is a long item that takes up a 1×4 space in the grid.
Cleaver
Continue beyond the library and the chamber filled with hanging bodies to find a tiled washroom lined with bathtubs. One cultist is bent over a tub. Sneak up and take them out, then retrieve the Cleaver from the tub.
Its description reads: “Cleaver — The blade is rusty, which makes it even more dangerous.” Like the knife and Machete, it is a bladed weapon, so it is a tool for unarmoured enemies rather than armoured ones.
Skullcrusher
Pass through the candle-lit shrine to get to the workshop/butchery, where a large table saw fills the room. The Skullcrusher rests on the saw table at the center. Two or three cultists patrol the area, including a tall armoured enemy wearing a spiked mask, so crouch and advance toward the table with care.
It is a wooden club studded with nails and wire, described as “Skullcrusher — Rusty nails at the top add to the usefulness.” This is the blunt weapon, and the one that lets you actually hurt armoured cultists.
Pistol
You can get the Pistol after the power goes out. In Room 206, hit the override button to unlock the security door. Just past it, a dying detective is slumped against the wall, still holding the Pistol; use “F Equip” to take it.
Its description reads: “Pistol — Easy to use and deadly, if the target is not too far.” It uses Pistol Ammo, a “.45ACP cartridge. Reliable stopping power”, and arrives with only one or two rounds plus the ammo recipe: 1 Scraps + 1 Gunpowder = 7 rounds. Controls are RMB to aim, LMB to shoot, and R to reload.
There is no gun before this one, and no weapon-upgrade screen appears anywhere in the compound.
Which weapon to use against armoured cultists
Use the Skullcrusher. Blades throw sparks and do nothing when you swing them at armour — a Machete hit on an armoured cultist is wasted. The game spells out the rule itself: “Bladed weapons are ineffective at breaking armor. Use a blunt weapon instead.” Blunt weapons stagger enemies and smash plating, while blades are built for bleeding and dismembering unarmoured flesh.
- Blunt weapons break armour and stagger, but can’t dismember.
- Bladed weapons dismember and cause bleeding, but bounce off armour.
- Aim for unarmoured body parts, or your hits won’t land with impact.
- A well-placed headshot still stings even through armour.
The compound throws several enemy types at you: unarmoured cultists in leather straps who fight with blades or bare hands, armoured cultists wearing metal plates and spiked masks, and a tall, heavily spiked one whose single hit takes off a large chunk of your health bar. From the living quarters onward you also meet cultists with guns and one who throws fire bottles. The Skullcrusher is what clears the heavily armoured chapel fight.
What to carry and how to keep it
Leave the Skullcrusher equipped for armoured enemies and open fights, and save one blade for unarmoured foes, where bleeding and dismembering are more useful. Keep the Pistol for emergencies and the red gas cylinders: ammunition is limited to a handful of loose rounds and whatever you craft, and shots alert the entire area.
Stealth takedowns cost nothing. Crouch behind an enemy who hasn’t seen you and use “F Takedown” to kill outright with whatever is equipped.
Use 1, 2, 3, or 4 to change weapons, and press Z to drop the one in hand. Tap F to equip a weapon lying on the ground; hold F to add it to your inventory. The grid has 4 columns and 10 rows. With three melee weapons and other items, you may see “INVENTORY FULL” and be unable to pick something up. If that happens, discard a spare blade—the Machete or Cleaver—instead of the Skullcrusher.
Melee weapons wear out with use. The Basic Repair Kit, found in Room 208 during the power cut, “will slightly extend the durability of a melee weapon”. To use it, open your inventory, go to the item menu, choose Repair, and pick the weapon — the Skullcrusher is the natural choice to keep going.
Death returns you to your last save and removes every weapon collected after it, so you must follow the same route and retrieve them again. Save before taking a newly acquired weapon into a fight in an unexplored area.
