Fire Dragon

Schierke tries to reach Guts through thought transference but cannot pierce his mind, the combined Od of the swordsman and the armor too fierce for her to enter. Grunbeld, respecting his opponent, swings his war hammer, and Guts answers with a vertical cut that bends the weapon's shaft into uselessness. A second downward stroke shears clean through the raised hammer and gashes the apostle's shoulder deep, the effort spraying blood from within the armor.

Conceding that his base form cannot win and praising Guts as a warrior beyond even his fearsome reputation, Grunbeld takes on a huge corundum-plated dragon shape to end the fight. He whips his crystalline tail at Guts, who catches it in his arms, breaking a leg as he braces yet refusing to yield, then drives the Dragon Slayer into the humanoid face perched atop the dragon's head. Grunbeld, his face cracked, hurls Guts off with a corundum head-spike, sending him tumbling to the roots of Flora's tree. Despite twisted limbs and grievous wounds, Guts presses forward, his body wrenched back into line by the armor. Schierke explains to Isidro and Serpico that the suit sustains combat by resetting broken bones with internal spikes, recalling a former wearer who fought to his final drop of blood. Wracked with guilt for handing the injured Guts the armor, she wavers until Flora's voice reassures her that she alone can free Guts from its hold.

Marking the start of the Holy Evil War Chapter within the Millennium Falcon Arc, this twenty-one-page installment ran in Young Animal issue seventeen on August 22, 2003. It debuts Grunbeld's massive corundum dragon form and details the Berserker Armor's bone-realigning mechanism, while charging Schierke with the task of saving Guts from its influence.