Rykard, Lord of Blasphemy - Elden Ring Guide - IGN (2024)

Rykard, Lord of Blasphemy, is one of the major bosses in Elden Ring and the leader of Volcano Manor. He seems to have been human once, but has since fused his body to the God-Devouring Serpent in hopes of devouring all the other gods.

You can access the Rykard boss fight in two ways: reaching the end of the Volcano Manor dungeon, or completing all of Lady Tanith's assassination missions.

Check out our boss strategy to defeating Rykard below:

Rykard, Lord of Blasphemy Boss Fight

Rykard is more of a fun fight than a challenging fight, similar to the Storm King from Demon's Souls and Yhorm the Giant from Dark Souls III. Upon entering the boss chamber you will find a dead body holding the Serpent-Hunter weapon. This weapon unleashes massive power when used against Rykard, making this fight (mostly) a breeze.

This fight is mostly trivialized by the Serpent-Hunter, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't strategize. If you have a lot of Somber Smithing Stones you can use them to upgrade this weapon to make it more powerful. I recommend pairing the spear with a 100% physical block shield that has the Art of War: Barricade Shield Ash on it. This will let you block and attack at the same time.

The first phase of this fight is against the God-Devouring Serpent. Because of the Serpent-Hunter's long range you don't need to get all that close to hit him, and you wouldn't want to anyways because of the magma. Find a spot where your light attack can hit the snake's head, then put up your shield and start swinging. The light attack takes very little stamina, so you should be able to attack a long time without stopping.

The only concerns in this phase are his grab, which he telegraphs by opening his mouth wide and roaring and his poison breath which he telegraphs by leaking poison smoke from his mouth. You shouldn't be very close to the snake anyways, so just back up a little more if you see either of these attacks coming. When the coast is clear move in again and keep attacking until phase one is over.

In phase two Rykard will reveal his true form and equip his disgusting sword. From here on Rykard will execute a mix of sweeping sword attacks (which are easily dodged with well-timed rolls, note the pause between his slam and sweep attack), explosive spells (which you can see coming, run or roll away between attacks), and snake head jabs, all while inching towards you.

Thankfully the strategy from phase one works just as well here, as long as you mix in a few more dodges when the spells come raining down. With good luck you can actually damage Rykard down and kill him before he can really cause any trouble, but the worst case scenario is when he summons the red magic cloud above himself which causes numerous homing spells to start chasing you down.

This combination of attacks becomes very hard to dodge, and you're almost better off just dying and hoping it doesn't happen next time. If you do manage to survive the barrage he will raise his sword skyward and slam it down with one last powerful attack before the cloud dispels.

But like I said, that is worst case scenario. Follow the strategy from phase one: shield up, light attack spam. You will block almost all of his outgoing damage (especially if you have a shield with Barricade), and only need to worry about taking a few seconds here or there to let your stamina refill.

Killing Rykard will get you the Remembrance of the Blasphemous and Rykard's Great Rune. Activate the Site of Grace, and grab the Eye Surcoat off the nearby body. From here you can return to Volcano Manor and speak with Lady Tanith, completing the manor's chain quest (return to the boss room after speaking with her to see a disturbing final scene).