Bipedal dinosaur sigil boss in the linear hallway below the Library. Killing him as Julius Belmont unlocks Soma Cruz.
technicallynotavampireGergoth is a Castlevania crossover sigil boss in the Ode to Castlevania DLC. He is a contact-damage encounter with no special attack pattern, designed to gate the Soma Cruz unlock behind a Julius Belmont kill.
Gergoth is a Castlevania crossover boss added to Vampire Survivors with the Ode to Castlevania DLC on October 31, 2024. He is a sigil-spawned enemy on the Ode to Castlevania stage, not a wave-timer boss like 
Death or the Reaper.
The character originates from Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, where he was the boss of the Demon Guest House. He returns in Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin as the second boss of the optional Nest of Evil dungeon.
His Castlevania design is unmistakable: a gray bipedal dinosaur with rotting flesh, no arms, and elaborate shackles binding his legs. The Vampire Survivors version reuses the sprite design, including the recognisable shackled-legs silhouette.
Mechanically the Vampire Survivors fight strips Gergoth down to a contact-damage encounter. His signature laser-beam attack from Dawn of Sorrow does not carry over.
That makes him one of the simpler sigil bosses to handle once a player reaches him. The walk-up is the harder part of the unlock chain, not the kill itself.
The Soma Cruz unlock makes Gergoth one of the highest-priority bosses on the Ode to Castlevania stage for completionist players. Soma is required for the 
Yoko Belnades chain (defeat Abbadon as Soma) and for the Dark Lord Soma alternate skin earned from the Adventure mode.
Skipping the Gergoth fight via the spell is mechanically equivalent for the unlock itself. Players who care about the achievement or the in-game completion log will need the boss kill on record.
Gergoth spawns from the first red sigil in the linear hallway below the Library, above the Capra Gate. Reach him by clearing the Stallion, Scorpion, and Capra Gates first, then navigating the Library maze and exiting south.
Julius Belmont is the only character whose Gergoth kill counts for the Soma unlock. Before the route can be run, Julius himself has to be unlocked through a separate chain.
His coffin sits in a hidden room inside the Library, accessed by walking through a red-cracked wall near the 
Paranoia boss. Both the Inlaid Library stage and the Ode to Castlevania stage need to be unlocked first.
Julius starts with the Vampire Killer whip, the iconic Belmont family weapon. The whip evolves with the right passive combination, and its damage scaling makes the Gergoth fight one of the easier sigil kills to close out.
Giant Bat for Stallion Gate, which enables 
Heart Refresh drops; 
Puppet Master for Scorpion Gate; Paranoia for Capra Gate).With Julius unlocked, start a fresh Ode to Castlevania run with him selected. The fastest path uses the church teleporter twice rather than walking the surface route.
Karma Coins begin dropping from candles.The unlock check fires on whoever lands the killing blow. In a Local Co-op or Couch Co-op session, a non-Julius partner can accidentally finish Gergoth and the Soma unlock will not register.
Solo runs are the cleanest way to guarantee credit. Players running co-op should keep the partner well clear of the sigil room until Julius confirms the kill.
Cast technicallynotavampire in the Forbidden Scrolls of Morbane menu to unlock Soma Cruz instantly. The spell skips the achievement and does not unlock Julius Belmont.
Forbidden Scrolls ShortcutThe full Julius walk-up can be skipped by casting technicallynotavampire in the Forbidden Scrolls of Morbane menu. Soma Cruz unlocks immediately at the same 1,000-coin purchase price.
The tradeoff: the Gergoth-related achievement does not register, and the bestiary entry for Gergoth still has to be filled separately for any completion tracking that requires it.
The spell name is a direct Castlevania reference. Soma Cruz is the reincarnation of Dracula but is technically not a vampire himself, which is the lore reason behind his shared health-drain immunity with the actual vampire characters.
The spell shortcut does not unlock Julius Belmont himself. Players who use the spell still need Julius separately to get the Vampire Killer evolution chain, the Brotherly Love passive, and any future unlocks tied to him.
The complete catalogue of these spell codes lives in the Forbidden Box spell menu reference.
Soma Cruz unlocks for purchase at 1,000 coins. Starting weapon Hand Grenade evolves into The RPG with max Candelabrador. Soul Steal triggers automatically on fatal damage as a built-in revive.
Soma Cruz is the direct payoff for defeating Gergoth as Julius. He becomes purchasable in the character menu for 1,000 coins, scaling with how many other characters have been bought.
His starting weapon is the 
Hand Grenade, which evolves into 
The RPG when paired with a maxed 
Candelabrador passive. The evolution alone is worth the unlock for explosive-build players.
| Stat or Effect | Value |
|---|---|
| Starting Weapon | Hand Grenade (evolves to The RPG with max Candelabrador) |
| Move Speed | +20% |
| Greed | +50% |
| Reroll / Skip / Banish | +5 each |
| Per-Level Growth | +1% Might per level (uncapped) |
| Health Drain Immunity | Yes (shared with vampire characters despite Soma being the reincarnation of Dracula) |
| Soul Steal Trigger | Once per life, on fatal damage, screen-wide damage that converts enemies to hearts |
Soma has a Candybox alternate starting weapon unlocked by collecting and using five specific weapons in a single run. The full list is below.
Once that condition is met, Candybox becomes selectable as a skin variant. Completing the Adventure mode for Ode to Castlevania unlocks the second skin: Dark Lord Soma Cruz, which is purely cosmetic and does not change his starting weapon or passives.
Levelling the Hand Grenade to level 7 on any character adds it to the standard random weapon pool. Evolving it into The RPG is the unlock condition for 
Jonathan Morris, which itself feeds into the longer 
Richter Belmont unlock chain.
That chain is one of the most impactful single-evolution paths in the DLC. The full sequence is documented in the Ode to Castlevania secrets and unlock catalogue.
Pairing the Hand Grenade with a maxed Candelabrador unlocks the evolution at any time after the weapon hits level 8. Players running Soma for the first time should keep Candelabrador as the priority passive pickup.
The RPG dramatically increases the area of every grenade explosion. Combined with Soma's +1% Might per level scaling, late-run damage output rises faster than most other Ode characters.
Soul Steal fires automatically when Soma takes fatal damage. The screen-wide damage tick converts enemies into HP-restoring hearts, giving Soma a built-in second life for risky sigil-boss walk-ups.
Soul Steal is the passive that makes Soma uniquely valuable for sigil-boss farming after the Gergoth kill. The once-per-life trigger fires automatically when Soma takes fatal damage.
The screen-wide damage tick converts surrounding enemies into hearts, which restore HP on pickup. For sigil-boss walk-ups where DPS is borderline, this functions as a built-in second life.
| Boss Walk | Required Character | Soul Steal Use |
|---|---|---|
 Abbadon (King's Gate) | Soma Cruz | Backup if RPG-build DPS falls short on the HP x Level multiplier |
| Treant (Wood Carving Stone) | Any | Soma is a strong general-purpose pick for this walk |
 Galamoth (post-Serpent Gate) | Any | Heart drops from the screen-wide hit help survive the long approach |
The defeat-Abbadon-as-Soma chain that unlocks Yoko Belnades is the next step after the Gergoth kill for anyone working through the full Ode roster. The walk and the boss kit are covered in the Abaddon Clock Tower boss guide.
Gergoth debuted in Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow (2005) as the Demon Guest House boss. He returned in Portrait of Ruin and Harmony of Despair, and appeared as a night creature in season 4 of the Castlevania Netflix series.
Gergoth is described in Castlevania lore as a once-gentle beast warped by magic and driven mad by imprisonment. The shackles on his legs in every depiction are the visual cue for that backstory.
His debut was Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow in 2005, where he served as the Demon Guest House boss and dropped the Gergoth Laser soul. That soul was a required component for forging the Balmung weapon on the path to the Claimh Solais.
The Gergoth Laser soul also had practical farming use in Dawn of Sorrow. It cleared Mermen quickly in the Wizardry Lab and was strong enough to destroy the locust formations during the Abaddon boss fight in the same game.
In Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin he reappears as the second boss of the optional Nest of Evil dungeon. The Nest of Evil version takes a quest twist: after the first kill, an NPC asks the player to defeat Gergoth a second time using only 
Charlotte's Blank Book, which has minimal range and damage.
The Blank Book quest is solvable by softening Gergoth with Jonathan's 1,000 Blades subweapon first, then switching to Charlotte for the killing blow. A weaker boss-rush variant of Gergoth also appears in the last room of Course 1 of Portrait of Ruin's Boss Rush mode, with roughly half the standard health pool.
Castlevania: Harmony of Despair carried Gergoth forward as the boss of its first chapter. There he sleeps for thirty seconds at the start of each run, then wakes and begins firing beams across the entire map until a player engages him directly.
The Harmony of Despair fight added a new attack: a slide and belly-flop, telegraphed by Gergoth jumping backward first. The standard Dawn of Sorrow poison-cloud attack was replaced with rapidly shooting entrails, and the default boss theme used was "Into the Dark Night."
Gergoth also has an animated-series appearance in season 4 of the Castlevania Netflix show. There he is a night creature controlled by the vampire warrior Dragan, killed by the combined efforts of 
Trevor Belmont, 
Sypha Belnades, and 
Alucard.
All three of those characters are also playable in Vampire Survivors as part of the Ode to Castlevania DLC roster. Their appearances are derived from their classic Castlevania sprite work rather than the Netflix designs.
The Castlevania Wiki describes Gergoth as a gray bipedal dinosaur with rotting flesh, no arms, no tail, seemingly empty eye sockets, and exposed ribs. When his mouth opens the loose facial skin retracts to reveal small beady eyes and pink underflesh.
The Vampire Survivors sprite preserves the no-arms silhouette and the shackled legs. The full Dawn of Sorrow attack pattern (poison cloud, curse cloud, petrification cloud, sweeping laser) is not implemented in this version.
Gergoth sits in a cluster of sigil bosses on the Library to Capra Gate route. Paranoia drops the Capra Gate, Brachyura drops Ice Fang, and Zephyr drops Gale Force.
Gergoth sits in a cluster of sigil bosses on the route between the Library and the Capra Gate. The neighbours along that path are listed below for completion runs.
| Boss | Location | Drop or Unlock |
|---|---|---|
| Paranoia | End of the Library | Capra Gate relic,  Mirror of Truth pickups from candles |
| Gergoth | Hallway below the Library, above Capra Gate | Soma Cruz unlock when killed by Julius Belmont |
 Brachyura | Southwest of the Capra Gate |  Ice Fang weapon |
| Zephyr | Halfway up the Clock Tower |  Gale Force weapon |
| Abbadon | Past the Zephyr rune in the Clock Tower |  King's Gate relic, Yoko Belnades when killed by Soma |
Each of these is a separate sigil-summoned boss, distinct from the wave-timer bosses like Death and the Reaper. The wave bosses appear automatically based on run time, while the sigil bosses only spawn when a player walks onto their plate.
| Date | Build | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 31 October 2024 | Ode to Castlevania DLC launch | Gergoth added to game as a sigil boss on the Ode to Castlevania stage. Soma Cruz unlock chain established. |
| 28 October 2025 | Update 1.14 (Ode expansion) | Adventure mode and additional roster content added to the same map. Gergoth boss kit unchanged. |
| 4 December 2025 | Steam beta 52172286R | Ode to Castlevania enemy hitbox pass. Gergoth was included in the broader update according to the wiki revision log. |
Gergoth's location in Vampire Survivors is the linear hallway just below the Library on the Ode to Castlevania stage map, above the Capra Gate. He spawns from the first red sigil encountered after exiting the Library maze and heading south past the Paranoia boss room.
Defeat Gergoth by stepping on his red sigil to spawn him, then dealing damage with whatever build you have at that point in the run. The fight is a contact-damage encounter with no special attack pattern, so any DPS-focused Julius Belmont build can finish him with the Vampire Killer whip alone.
On the Ode to Castlevania map, Gergoth sits in the linear corridor below the Library and above the Capra Gate. The fastest map route is to use the church teleporter twice to reach the Scorpion Gate, head north through the Alchemy Lab, navigate the Library maze, then exit south into the hallway containing his sigil.
Defeat Gergoth while playing as Julius Belmont. The kill must land on Julius specifically, not on a co-op partner. After the run completes, Soma Cruz becomes purchasable in the character menu for 1,000 coins.
No. The Gergoth fight can be skipped entirely by casting technicallynotavampire in the Forbidden Scrolls of Morbane menu. The spell unlocks Soma directly. The achievement tied to the boss kill will not register on the spell path.
Julius Belmont's coffin sits in a hidden room inside the Library on the Ode to Castlevania stage. Walk through the red-cracked tile on the left wall near the Paranoia boss to enter the chamber, then open the second coffin to add him to the roster.
The unlock fires on whoever lands the killing blow. If a non-Julius partner finishes Gergoth in co-op, Soma will not unlock. Solo runs or careful co-op positioning are the safe ways to guarantee credit.
Evolve the Hand Grenade by levelling it to maximum and picking up a maxed Candelabrador, then opening any chest. The evolution is The RPG. Levelling the base Hand Grenade to level 7 also adds it to the standard random weapon pool for non-Soma characters.
Boss location, spawn mechanics, and Soma Cruz unlock chain pulled from the official Vampire Survivors Wiki on Weirdgloop. Lore and Castlevania series history cross-referenced with the Castlevania Wiki on Fandom.
Step-by-step Library route verified against multiple Ode to Castlevania DLC walkthroughs published shortly after the October 2024 launch.
Sprite assets and stat data derived from the Vampire Survivors Wiki, hosted by Weirdgloop and licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 3.0. Vampire Survivors and the Ode to Castlevania DLC are trademarks of poncle. Castlevania and associated characters are trademarks of Konami. This guide is an independent reference and is not affiliated with poncle or Konami.