Artorius Collbrande

Backstory

10 years before the events of the main story in Tales of Berseria, Artorius claimed that he failed his master and wished for death to a woman just outside the village of Aball. However, the woman handed him an apple and gave him a reason to live. Taking the name "Arthur," he ended up marrying the woman, named Celica Crowe, and supported both Celica and her sister Velvet with his work.

However, a Scarlet Night happened, where a band of brigands who attacked Aball were overcome with malevolence and transformed into demons. During the night, Celica and her unborn son both died as she took a blow meant for Arthur and fell into a pit at the local shrine. Artorius managed to slay the demons, but lost his right arm in the process. Another exorcist named Melchior claimed that the rest of Aball sold him out so that they could survive the night. Surprisingly, both Celica and her unborn son were reincarnated as "malakhim." Artorious forged a pact with the reborn Celica, now known as Seres, and vowed to resurrect an ancient Empyrean known as Innominat to suppress humanity's emotions and banish malevolence from the world.

Seven years after that tragedy, another Scarlet Night came about, where Artorious offered up the body of Velvet's kind but sickly brother, Laphicet, as a sacrifice to resurrect Innominat at the same shrine as before. Velvet attempted to save Laphicet from Artorius and fell into the pit together. While Artorius succeeded putting his plans into motion, Velvet emerged from the pit as a Therion, with a demon-infused left arm, capable of eating other demons and people. Artorius took down Velvet and threw her in a deep prison cell on the island of Titania.

Three years passed from that night, later called the Advent, where thanks to Laphicet's sacrifice, Artorius was able to expand the ranks of the exorcists and provide many of them with their own bonded malakhim to destroy the demons. With the power and the fame granted from the Advent, Artorius gave humanity a way to fight back against the hordes of demons and turned the Abbey into the defacto government of the Midgand Empire. However, while this happened, he continued to locate other semi-demonic Therions and had them entrapped at Earthpulse points, planning to use their power and malevolence to resurrect Innominat and suppress humanity's emotions for good.

Eventually, Artorius was able to resurrect Innominat, but the actions of Velvet and her crew kept him from finalizing his plan. As Velvet led her party into Innominat's base high above the world, Artorius and Innominat faced off against her, first separately, and then together as an armatized being. Velvet rips Innominat out of Artorius, then impales him with his own sword. As Artorius dies, he wonders aloud if he would have acted differently if Velvet and Laphicet died that day instead of his wife and unborn son. Velvet responds that he probably would have fought just as hard for them in that case.