Wyald

Wyald
Basics
Status	Deceased
Fatal event	Killed by Zodd
Anatomy
Kind	Human (formerly) Apostle
Gender	Male
Hair color	Black
Prestige
Occupation(s)	Mercenary
Rank(s)	Leader of the Black Dog Knights
Affiliations	Black Dog Knights God Hand
Chronology
First appearance	Episode 58 Flower of the Royal Palace of Stone
Image Gallery

Geez, talk about uncouth. Being bothered while I'm slaying or laying... ...pisses me off the most!
– Wyald

Wyald (ワイアルド, Waiarudo^?) is an apostle who was the leader of the Black Dog Knights, an army of convicted murderers and rapists working for the Kingdom of Midland. Possessing ape features and abnormal fighting abilities, Wyald is characterized by his carefree personality, wanton bloodlust and sexuality.

Appearance

Even in his human form, there is something abnormal about his features, with Barbo and Guts calling him a monkey. He has a long, jutting face and wide eyes with wild, thick hair and heavy brows. He is shown to be rippling with muscle with a thick coating of body hair. When going into battle, Wyald dons thick animal skins and pelts alongside armor, including an actual skinned dog as a helm.

In his apostle form, his arms fuse into his torso as his waist transform into an ape-like body with a mouth in his "chest" that has a flower-like penile tongue and multiple eyes across his body, one on each shoulder, and one at the fusion of his upper waist and lower neck.

Personality

Wyald is showed as someone who is aware of the importance of going beyond the ordinary to have troops obey, be it by power, charisma or fear. He is a libertine, always following his motto "Excitement and Enjoyment". He possesses a gleeful lust for battle. Guts himself comments on his carelessness, that his technique is sloppy and he compensates by pure reflex. He often puts his men in serious danger for the sake of "fun", recklessly charging them through the Band of the Falcon's traps, killing a soldier beforehand after he protests and massacring them when they lose their morale. Wyald has absolutely no semblance of morality or empathy and takes a sadistic pleasure in his actions. He rapes and mutilates women, burns children alive, kills his own soldiers mostly for fun, and strips Casca and Griffith naked in front of their own men.

However, when the situation is dire, Wyald loses his usual cocky and playful attitude and becomes desperate, holding Griffith hostage in order to summon the God Hand to restore him. He later attempts to justify his actions to Nosferatu Zodd, who quickly kills him.

Abilities

Wyald has a massive amount of strength, as he is capable of crushing one of his men's skulls with only two fingers, punches a falling boulder into pieces, stops Guts' sword with his teeth and a single hand, and rips a tree apart with his hands. He also has superhuman reflexes and speed, being able to parry/block all of Guts' attacks with ease using a simple log. Similarly, Wyald is able to capture Casca, who is known for being an agile fighter. He knows how to use psychological fear and charisma to the point he is able to intimidate his hardened criminal soldiers and make them obey.

Though he is not skilled, his apostle abilities made up for this to the point he could overwhelm more experienced and skilled opponents. While he is already immensely powerful and agile in his human form, his apostle form presents a massive boost in his basic abilities to the point where he can take out dozens of armed men with a tree trunk. His attacks also prove strong enough to break Guts' large sword.

Story

Background

Very little is known about Wyald's life before he became an apostle, other than that he was a small frail old man. At some point after becoming an apostle, he became a convict. It was this imprisonment which led him to meet the King of Midland five years prior to Griffith's escape, who ordered all able bodied criminals to be assembled and drafted into war. Wyald volunteered as leader of this new army, claiming that he was the strongest and the position was his by right. An enormous man known as Barbo the armor hacker approached to challenge his claim and the two fought to the death for the right of leadership. In order to earn the fear and respect of the other convicts, Wyald killed him in a spectacular fashion; by impaling him on the spike of a tower. Wyald and his army of convicts, named the "Black Dog Knights," gained an infamous reputation for being the most cruel army in all of Midland, as their habit of instigating atrocities caused the King to send them to remote battlefields to keep them away from his sight.

Golden Age Arc

Wyald appears before Guts

When the Band of the Falcon rescue Griffith and escort him out of Wyndham, the King orders the Black Dog Knights to hunt them down. Though Wyald is reluctant to carry out the task as he had something else to do that day, he changes his mind upon hearing it had to do with Griffith breaking out of jail - the one his interests were at. In pursuit of the Band of the Falcon, Wyald's group comes across a farm that housed people who aided them, having all the residents slaughtered and the women raped. When the Black Dogs come in contact with the Band of the Falcon, they fall victim to their traps, with only Wyald and a few of his men continuing after them before the pursuit turn into a full on battle.

Wyald transforms before Guts and the Band of the Falcon

After realizing his men are outmatched, and killing them indiscriminately when morale fell, Wyald decides to assume his true form. After a long and brutal fight against Guts, Wyald is critically wounded (for the first time in 100 years, according to his words) and presumed dead with the scouts guarding the corpse. However, Wyald was feigning death and kills the scouts before crawling to the Band of the Falcon's camp and taking Griffith hostage, intending to start the Eclipse early to save his own life and not end at the Vortex after having been told by Zodd that Griffith would become "one of the great ones". After destroying their morale by stripping Griffith down to reveal the full extent of the torture inflicted upon him, Wyald panics, unable to find Griffith's beherit. He is then impaled on the horns of Zodd, who intervenes to ensure that the beherit shall return to Griffith, as "that's how it is". Wyald begs for mercy, justifying that he was only following the God Hand's one law of "Do as thou wilt". Zodd rebuts that to be his reason to kill Wyald, ripping his stomach open as he yells that Griffith is not the one they think he is. Now dead, Wyald's spiritual essence is dragged into the Abyss with his body reverting to that of the old man he used to be.

Portrayal

Japanese Voice Actor(s)

• Shigeru Chiba: Berserk - Kaishingeki! Dotō no Yōhei-dan
• Kunihiro Kawamoto: Berserk Musou

Notes

• Wyald has not appeared in either the animated series or the movie series. Because of his omission, the destruction of Guts' sword during this particular part of the Golden Age arc isn't explored either.
  • Wyald's first adaptation appearance occurs in the pachinko adaptation "Berserk - Kaishingeki! Dotō no Yōhei-dan", during its February 26th 2014 event.
  • Wyald speaks several English phrases in the game Berserk and the Band of the Hawk, notably his creed "Enjoy and Excite!" and the calls of his apostle attacks.
• Wyald is the first apostle that Guts successfully defeats, although not the first one he fought.
• How he was able to be captured despite his powers is unknown.
• Wyald somehow knew of the jailer at the Tower of Rebirth and how he tortured Griffith.
• Wyald is the first apostle that is killed by another apostle.