Boomstick: The Last Dragonborn, the dragon-slaying savior of Skyrim.
Wiz: Resigned to captivity, these two demi-human heroes embraced their destinies and stared down the very gods themselves...
Boomstick: And devoured their friggin' souls!
The second episode of DEATH BATTLE!'s tenth season sees a first for the series, pitting two fully customizable Action RPG heroes against each other. As both do not have a canonical set of weapons, armor or skills, the hosts instead opt to give them access to all available equipment and abilities and set them at the maximum possible level, as such is possible within both combatants' games of origin with enough dedication and time. Thus will the undying hero of Lordran be pitted against Skyrim's savior in the confines of a death battle.
To start off, we learn about the world where the Chosen Undead comes from, which is not a very nice place to live. All of its great cities have collapsed, any heroes have either died or gone insane and the Golden Age is at an end. Unfortunately for anyone and everyone who wishes to die, death isn't possible due to the world being gripped by the Undead curse which transforms anyone with a Darksign into mindless Hollows after several deaths.
Luckily, there exists a prophecy of a Chosen Undead who will travel to Lordran, the home of the Gods and save the world from its grim fate. This Chosen Undead was imprisoned in an asylum, but they managed to escape with a little help from an unfortunate knight and a giant raven, allowing him to begin their quest through their predecessor's homeland.
It is also noted that the very curse that causes the suffering of many happens to be the Chosen Undead's greatest strength- as long as they can maintain their sense of purpose, they will continually ressurect at a nearby bonfire if they are vanquished- no matter how, ranging from impalement to being eaten to having their very soul stolen, nothing will keep an Undead down forever.
The Chosen Undead can also increase their power through consuming the souls of fallen foes, and on top of this, they are a master with a variety of weapon types, from hammers, to spears, to bows, and so on, allowing a Chosen Undead to specialise, ranging from a cartwheeling assassin to a dragon-smashing tank, or even a "giant dad".
Some of these weapons can include more exotic ones, like the utterly massive Smough's Great Hammer, which is the size of a car and weighs over a hundred tons, similarly to Gough's Greatbow, which shoots pillar-sized arrows to kill flying dragons in a single shot, or Boomstick's personal favourite, the Moonlight Greatsword, a universe-hopping anomaly that is acquired by cutting off the tail of Seath the Scaleless, founder of sorcery, and can fire beams of energy when swung.
The Chosen Undead is no slouch when it comes to magic, either, with various spells ranging from shockwaves, barriers, damage reflection, mind control, crystal spears, invisibility and spears of sunlight that can peel stone scales off of dragons. If they run out of magic, though, they can also use the Vow of Silence to prevent their enemies from casting spells in its vicinity.
Special mention is also given to the Chosen Undead's trademark manoeuvre, the dodge roll, though its property of nullifying even the deadliest of attacks is noted to just be a game mechanic.
They're noted to have defeated countless godlike beings, from the God of Death to the mother of demonkind to the strongest of the surviving ancient dragons. They've even bested the legendary knight Artorias and the knight's fated foe, Manus, father of the abyss, and even Chosen Undead from other worlds like Solaire have been defeated by the Chosen Undead's hand.
The Chosen Undead would later be met with a dilemma- two serpentine beings would approach them, one telling them to "link the fire", and the other to "let it die", which Boomstick doesn't understand, and Wiz doesn't want to go over the convoluted lore of Dark Souls, either, so they call in Jocelyn the intern.
Jocelyn explains the history of the First Flame, and the age of the Gods. However, it turns out the Undead "curse" of immortality is actually humanity's natural state in the world of Dark Souls, and it being referred to as a curse is merely the propaganda of the gods.
Linking the flame involves a Chosen Undead using their very soul as fuel to keep the First Flame burning, and given that most Undead believe their immortality to be a curse, they are willing to do anything to get rid of it, including burning themselves up to fuel the First Flame- essentially, being a pawn in a game played by decript old gods desperately clinging to power.
The immense power of a soul needed to fuel what is essentially the Big Bang and the Chosen Undead's comparability to beings capable of dodging light itself is immensely impressive, and they eventually faced down and felled Gwyn, Lord of Cinders at the Kiln of the First Flame.
Here, however, is where the most depressing fact of Dark Souls is revealed: there is no happy ending. Regardless of the Chosen Undead's choice, the cycle just continued with new heroes replacing the old ones until there was nary an afterthought of the Chosen Undead, with the only thing able to define them being the struggle they faced along the way.
- Wiz: This is the biggest bummer of them all. Truth is, it never mattered. The cycle just continues age after age, with new heroes replacing the old ones until the Chosen Undead was long forgotten...
Jocelyn: Until the infinite march of time ground the world to ash. It was never about the happy ending; it didn't exist. It was about the struggle to get there. That's ultimately what gives us meaning.
After an advertisement for Brandon Yates' music, we take a trip to the frosty world of Skyrim.
"Hey, you. You're finally awake." The memetic line that heads off the beginning of the fifth Elder Scrolls game is used to introduce the setting of the Dragonborn's adventures, the frigid lands of Skyrim, featuring places like quaint Nordic villages, the Throat of the World, the highest point in Skyrim, and Blackreach, a beautiful underground city. But of course, the most noteworthy thing about Skyrim is in fact Macho Man Randy Savage- no, it's Thomas the Tank Engine- no, putting aside all of the Skyrim mods, it's a dragon, but the dragon shown is far from the ordinary dragons one would be used to.
This is Alduin, the World-Eater, who has come to burn everything to cinders. However, Alduin's attack came at the right time to interrupt and derail one particular prisoner's execution at the hands of the Imperials. Alduin would later come to regret this greatly, as not long after, that prisoner would go on to slay a dragon and absorb their soul.
This could only mean one thing: They were a being with the soul of a dragon in the body of one of the many races of Tamriel destined to defeat Alduin and save the world. In the Dragon's own tongue, they are the Dovahkiin: Dragonborn!
During their journey in Tamriel, The Dragonborn became a jack of all trades, and master of all, learning skills like Assassination from the Dark Brotherhood, Thievery from the Nightingales, Magic with the College of Winterhold, dragon-slaying with the Blades, and even lycanthropy with the Companions. Mention is also made of their contributions during the Skyrim Civil War, though neither Boomstick nor Wiz can agree on who is in the right: Boomstick sides with the Stormcloaks, Wiz with the Empire.
After a brief mention of their unique method of thievery by putting buckets over their marks' heads, mention is then made to the Dragonborn's weaponry- not just the standard ones like daggers, swords, axes and hammers, but also artifacts handed to them by Daedric Princes, essentially gods from the plane of existence known as Oblivion. Special mention is given to the Wabbajack, a staff that casts random effects on the target that was received from Sheogorath, Dawnbreaker, a sword that is anathema to the undead that was received from Meridia, and, while not technically a Daedric weapon, Auriel's Bow, which can shoot arrows to the sun in seconds is also mentioned, a feat placed at about 250 times faster than light.
However, the planet Skyrim takes place on is called Nirn, and the Sun is instead Magnus, a hole that goes through Oblivion to reach Aetherius, a dimension of pure magic, and as such, the distance between them (and thus, the speed of the arrows) is far greater.
The Dragonborn is also no stranger to spells, such as healing themselves, creating wards to protect against opposing magic, casting destructive elemental attacks, controlling minds, conjuring weapons or summoning lesser Daedra to help them out in battle, and this is made all the more potent by their constantly regenerating pool of mana.
However, the Dragonborn's most famous ability comes in the form of the Thu'um, which involves speaking the words of Dragons to manifest will into reality. Special mention is given to the legendary "Fus Ro Dah" or Unrelenting Force, a shockwave that can send people flying, or Soul Tear, "Rii Vaaz Zol" which can rip an opponent's soul out of their body and store it in a soul gem like Azura's Star. Boomstick attempts to demonstrate on Wiz, but when it doesn't work, Wiz bemoans that he had to sell his soul to pay off his student loans.
Amongst other things, the Dragonborn's Thu'um is also capable of summoning country-spanning storms, slowing down time, or even calling upon a dragon to aid them in battle, Odahviing. While Dragons in Skyrim may have the traditional look down-pat, they are actually immortal demigods and children of the chief god of Tamriel's pantheon.
The Dragonborn is then described as an unstoppable force of nature, and even in the event that they do take damage, they can just drink a potion or eat a cheese wheel to recover. These cheese wheels were estimated to weigh 70 pounds, and the Dragonborn can carry up to 150 of them at once, meaning they can carry 10,500 pounds of cheese. This is understandable, given how they can also square off against giants, who are powerful enough to break the game's code, launching unsuspecting victims into space.
The Last Dragonborn has defeated the vampire lord Harkon, ended Skyrim's civil war, and even fought and defeated the very first Dragonborn, Miraak, whose Thu'um was powerful enough to split the island of Solstheim from Skyrim's mainland, a feat that was calculated to be worth approximately 300 teratons of TNT. Considering that people like the Greybeards can shake the planet itself with their Thu'um alone, this isn't anything too crazy.
Eventually, the Dragonborn confronted Alduin in the Nordic afterlife of Sovngarde and defeated him once and for all. It's noted that Alduin's epithet, "World-Eater", is quite literal, as he was going to consume everything: not just Nirn, but the entire Kalpa, which is the entire timeline; past, present and future.
In conclusion, while the continent of Tamriel is no stranger to marvelous champions, when a shout is heard and a Dragon's death throes soon follow, there is only one hero it could possibly be. The analysis ends with Boomstick trying and failing to sing "The Song of the Dragonborn."
- Wiz: Tamriel is no stranger to great heroes across its vast, sprawling history. The Neravarine, The Hero of Kvatch, all magnificent in their own right.
Boomstick: But when you heard that Shout echo through the mountains, and the death throes of a dragon defeated, you knew it could only be the Dovahkiin. Dovahkiin, Dovahkiin!
After a brief advertisement for Death Battle's Youtube Membership plans, the two heroes chosen by destiny have been sufficiently analysed, and thus, it's time for a death battle!
The Last Dragonborn enters the Kiln of the First Flame as the voice of Darkstalker Kaathe tells him to stop the one who he claims is trying to let the flame burn humanity to ashes. The Chosen Undead is then seen linking to the First Flame before noticing the Dragonborn in the reflection of his Astoran Knight helmet. The voice of Kingseeker Frampt tells him that the Dragonborn is an agent of darkness who is trying to snuff out the light, prompting the Chosen Undead to draw his sword and face his opponent.
FIGHT!
The Dovahkiin begins by unleashing his signature shout which the Chosen Undead guards against using his shield, then he jumps into the smoke and clashes his sword and shield with his opponent's blade, but the Chosen Undead parries the Dovahkiin's last blow and knocks him backwards with a slash that narrowly misses his stomach. The Last Dragonborn then rushes forward to slash at his opponent again, only for the Chosen Undead to dodge roll away from each swing of his sword.
After a few more dodge rolls, the Chosen Undead swings Smough's Great Hammer at the Last Dragonborn who manages to block it, but is still knocked backwards by the impact. The Dohvakiin manages to impale his sword in the ground to stop himself from skidding along the ground, then whips out Auriel's Bow to fire arrows at the Chosen Undead who manages to block or avoid all of them, except for one that impales him in the knee. With a moan of pain, he pulls the arrow out of his knee, much to the surprise of the Dovahkiin.
The Chosen Undead pulls out Gough's Greatbow to fire a greatarrow at them, but the Last Dragonborn stops it mere inches from his face by unleashing his time-stopping shout and then rushes forward to impale the Chosen Undead in the chest. As time returns to normal, the Dovahkiin unleashes his Soul Tear shout to absorb the Chosen Undead's soul into Azura's Star. As the Chosen Undead's body falls to the floor, the Dovahkiin turns to see them emerging from the First Flame with a Sorcerer Staff instead of a sword.
In response, the Dovahkiin casts flames from his hand, which the Chosen Undead blocks with their shield and fires a Soul Arrow through the flames to strike the Dovahkiin, disrupting his casting and giving the Chosen Undead the chance to deliver repeated sword strikes against the Dovahkiin. As he's knocked to the ground, though, he shouts Odahviing's name for the Call Dragon Shout, summoning the red dragon to his aid. Odahviing proceeds to do as dragons do and breathe fire on the Chosen Undead, who attempts to block it with his shield, but cannot withstand it and dies once again, his body bursting to cinders. Knowing what happens next, the Dovahkiin takes the opportunity to heal himself with restoration magic.
Odahviing roars in triumph over his foe, only to promptly be met with a greatarrow through the snout, as the dovah falls to the ground defeated. The Chosen Undead then throws Gough's Greatbow to the side and turns towards the newly-healed Dovahkiin, who promptly unleashes Storm Call to litter the field with lightning bolts, and follows up with a lightning spell, as the Chosen Undead charges and readies a pair of sunlight spears. The two attacks clash, causing a massive explosion that blankets the kiln in smoke.
The Chosen Undead, as he's getting to his feet, notices the Moonlight Greatsword, and takes it in hand, echoing an appearance of the blade in another world. Meanwhile, the Dovahkiin also gets to his feet, grabs and brandishes Dawnbreaker. The two warriors clash blades once again, with the Chosen Undead getting the upper hand with the Moonlight Greatsword's ranged capabilities. To try to reclaim momentum, the Dovahkiin attempts to use Unrelenting Force once again, but the Chosen Undead is prepared this time and responds with the Vow of Silence, causing the Dovahkiin's attempt at channeling the Thu'um to whiff. The Chosen Undead attempts to capitalize on this opportunity, but the Dovahkiin dodges the slash and impales the Chosen Undead with Dawnbreaker, causing them to drop their sword.
However, the Chosen Undead's tenacity shines through, and even though they've been stabbed and dropped their sword, they decide to take a more up-close and personal approach, preventing the Dovahkiin from pulling out their sword and attempting to choke them out, while also telling the Dovahkiin to prepare to die. However, the Chosen Undead speaking lets the Dovahkiin know the Vow of Silence has worn off, and with a single cry of "Fus!", manages to repel the Chosen Undead, and then stab them and slit their throat with Dawnbreaker.
As the Chosen Undead falls a third time, Kingseeker Frampt realizes the hopelessness of the fight and commands the Chosen Undead to link the First Flame, which they do, sacrificing their body and soul to summon a massive firestorm that threatens to consume the Dovahkiin. In turn, the Dovahkiin summons all his strength for one final Unrelenting Force, extinguishing the First Flame and rendering the Chosen Undead's sacrifice for naught. The Dovahkiin then collapses in exhaustion as Darkstalker Kaathe rejoices in the beginning of the Age of Dark, crowning the Dovahkiin the new Dark Lord.
KO!
Darkstalker Kaathe finally gets his wish, with the Dovahkiin ushering in the Age of Dark in a very fascinating match-up to analyze. Both legendary demihuman godslayers boast feats and arsenals befitting the status of who they've killed, but the Last Dragonborn held key advantages needed to snuff out the embers of his tenacious opponent. The Dragonborn had more access to summons, better training and regenerating magic supplies that directly countered the Chosen Undead's limited access, and while Vow of Silence prevented him from employing magic and Shouts, it wouldn't last long enough to matter. While the Chosen Undead could scale to his successors' ability to dodge beams of light, the Dragonborn could scale to Auriel's Bow, which can output speeds 250 times faster and even hit infinity. Granted, the Chosen Undead would never be able to truly stay dead; Elder Scrolls undead aren't the same as those from Dark Souls, who are theorized to actually be naturally immortal and wouldn't be subject to the Dragonborn's anti-undead weaponry, nor would techniques like Soul Tear be effective as Dark Souls Undead can survive having their souls being torn. Contrast with the Last Dragonborn, who could still only afford to die once due to lacking his opponent's resurrection immortality.
The hosts ponder that while the Chosen Undead - with his theoretically infinite amount of tries - could just come back and back again, the Dragonborn was simply too powerful for him to contend with. Putting behind scaling to the continent-splitting Miraak or being able to call upon thunderstorms with Shouts, the Dragonborn's might could only be truly proven by scaling him and his opponent to some of the strongest showings in Elder Scrolls and Dark Souls lore, as gameplay alone could do neither side justice. The Chosen Undead being able to sustain the First Flame with his soul is mightily impressive, as the First Flame itself governs all concepts in its universe. However, the Dragonborn slaying Alduin is even more so, as Alduin had threatened to consume the Elder Scrolls multiverse, which is comprised of multiple infinitely-spanning planes of reality that dwarfs Dark Souls' own, especially as the First Flame couldn't match it due to needing strong enough souls to kindle it as it dies out. This meant that no matter what, the Chosen Undead could simply not overpower the Dragonborn and suffering defeat after defeat would eventually drive him Hollow, which in and of itself is considered a form of "death" for those in Dark Souls.
Wiz: The winner is the Dragonborn!
"Skyrim VS Dark Souls" contains examples of:
- Always Someone Better: While both are powerful demigods, the Last Dragonborn is far more powerful in every category with power bordering on infinite. This power gulf is so large that the Chosen Undead simply would never win even with their Resurrective Immortality, and thus inevitably go Hollow.
- Book Ends: The first and last attack of the fight is the Dragonborn's Unrelenting Force shout.
- Character Customization: Both combatants are fully customizable blank slates that can be altered in any way by the player, from weapons to appearance to even gender (and in the Dragonborn's case, race). To handle the wide variety of possible playstyles for each combatant, Wiz and Boomstick use composite versions of them who have access to all of the skills and equipment in their respective games, and the animation uses the default male avatars for both.
- Cutting the Knot: While initially keen on fighting the Dragonborn, who's come to stop the Chosen Undead from linking with the First Flame. By the third time they get mortally wounded the Chosen Undead simply decides to link with the flame while the Dragonborn is still around.
- Deliberate Injury Gambit: Toward the end of the fight, the Chosen Undead lets himself get stabbed by the Dragonborn's sword, which it should be noted is exceedingly lethal to any undead creature; while the Chosen Undead isn't truly "undead" he still gets set aflame in the process. He uses this to his advantage and pulls the sword deeper so as to get close enough to strangle the Dragonborn.
- Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?:
- The Chosen Undead one-shots the dragon Odahviing with a giant arrow to the head, the dragons of the Elder Scrolls series being immortal divine beings older than time itself (though assuming he didn't absorb his soul shortly afterwards, Odahving is no more permanently dead than the Chosen Undead).
- The end of the fight has the Dragonborn snuffing out the First Flame using Unrelenting Force. Which is effectively the Big Bang and Cosmic Keystone of the Dark Souls universe.
- The Dragonborn managing to punch out Alduin, the World Eater is a deciding factor. Alduin is capable of consuming the entire Elder Scroll's universe, which due to the planets being their own infinite planes of reality, makes him multiversal in scope. This means to match or exceed him, the Dragonborn must also be such, and thus outclasses the Chosen Undead.
- Failure Is the Only Option: Part of the result is reasoning that the sheer difference of power between the Chosen Undead and the Dragonborn means that despite the former having theoretically millions of chances to beat the Dragonborn they would constantly lose and would eventually go Hollow.
- Formula-Breaking Episode: The first episode in the history of DEATH BATTLE to feature characters whose skills, weapons, and armor are all fully customizable by the players in their home settings; something the show creators are normally hesitant to do precisely because of the customization factor. In this case, however, they get around this by giving both the Chosen Undead and the Dragonborn access to every available skill and weapon at their disposal, which Boomstick points out that it is entirely possible for a player to do if they wanted to grind for it.
- Hero Antagonist: Effectively, both fighters are this to each other. The Chosen Undead seeks to link the First Flame and continue the Age of Fire, while the Dragonborn seeks to stop them and allow the Age of Dark to finally come. According to Dark Souls lore, neither outcome is truly 'bad,' and thus neither is the actual bad guy in this instance.
- Let's You and Him Fight: The Dragonborn is directed to fight the Chosen Undead by Darkstalker Kaathe. As such, it's the Dragonborn fighting to allow the First Flame to go out while the Chosen Undead is fighting to link the Flame and continue the Age of Fire.
- Mythology Gag:
- The Chosen Undead initially manages to annoy the Dragonborn by employing the tried and true Dark Souls tactic of constantly rolling out of the way of his strikes.
- Shooting arrows at the Chosen Undead, the Dragonborn manages to hit him in the knee, a nod to Skyrim's infamous "arrow to the knee" meme. However, the Chosen Undead is unaffected and simply pulls it out (although after the fight he did stop being an adventurer).
- When the Chosen Undead brings out the Moonlight Greatsword, he brings the blade up to his face and frames it in an identical shot to Ludwig when he transitions in his boss battle from "the Accursed" to "the Holy Blade" upon taking up the blade.
- When the Chosen Undead attempts to strangle the Dragonborn, he tells him "Prepare to Die", the Tag Line of Dark Souls.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: By destroying the Chosen Undead and snuffing the First Flame with his Unrelenting Force shout, the Dragonborn ensures Darkstalker Kaathe's victory and begins the Age of Dark. Of course, given Dark Souls lore, whether or not this is a bad thing is ambiguous.
- Pre-Mortem One-Liner: The Chosen Undead delivers one as he chokes the life out of the Dragonborn, telling his opponent, "Prepare to Die." Unfortunately, the one-liner is prematurely given as the Dragonborn quickly turns the tide.
- Post-Victory Collapse: The Dragonborn drops onto his back and goes unconscious out of sheer exhaustion after finally extinguishing the Chosen Undead.
- Resurrective Immortality: Due to the Undead Curse, the Chosen Undead (and everyone else in the Dark Souls universe) is unable to stay dead, with each death leading them to be resurrected at the nearest Bonfire, suffering the slow loss of their identity, personality and sanity and becoming feral Hollows by the end of it. On the plus side, almost nothing can actually put them down for good, not even getting their soul sucked (which the Dragonborn does with the Soul Tear shout). It should be noted, however, that becoming a Hollow was considered a form of death, and the Chosen Undead simply did not have enough power to bring the Dragonborn down before that would happen. In the animation, the Chosen Undead is killed three times, and upon nearing his third death opts to link the First Flame and become a Lord of Cinder... and then is promptly disintegrated (and the First Flame extinguished) by the Dragonborn's Unrelenting Force shout, putting him down for good.
- Rule of Cool: The inclusion of the First Flame in the climax of the fight goes against how Death Battle typically rules environments as being an almost complete nonfactor in their results but having the climax of the fight being the Chosen Undead sacrificing their soul to link the First Flame and having the Dragonborn deal with the resulting fire is much more dramatic than the Dragonborn repeatedly killing the Chosen Undead until the latter is an immobile husk.
- Suddenly Voiced: The Chosen Undead, normally mute beyond grunts of effort and cries of pain, pipes up to deliver his series' tag line, "Prepare to Die."
- Shout-Out: Near the end of the Chosen Undead's preview, Wiz mentions how he fruitlessly tried to decipher how the Moonlight Greatsword existed in almost every FromSoftware game and series; not just the Soulsbourne games and Elden Ring, but earlier IPs shown like King's Field, Ninja Blade, and Armored Core, to name a few.
- Unstoppable Force Meets Immovable Object: The Dragonborn is the unstoppable force being much stronger, faster, and more experienced, with a much better arsenal while the Chosen Undead is the immovable object as while they are much weaker than the Dragonborn in about every way they'll keep being resurrected. Ultimately the unstoppable force wins as the power gap is so wide that it's much more likely for the Chosen Undead to go Hollow due to repeated resurrections then for them to get lucky and beat the Dragonborn.
