Villain-Beating Artifact

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Welcome to my cave, young adventurous Hero. Here pick one of these two weapons, because at your current level you can't defeat the villain or punching out Cthulhu. He, his mooks, and scientific experiment pet, will defeat you in less than a minute, during the Curb Stomp Battle, if you do not use this weapon.

The first weapon was forge by purest minerals, one of it's special ingredients is virgin tears of joy. This artifact is able to take on and even kill Evil Incarnate itself. Even sealing it.

The second weapon is a whip that's handed down by the legendary vampire hunters, whose heir is lost in history. If you are related to her, this will boost your current spells and strength to be on an equal match with the Big Bad.

Subtrope of Plot Coupon That Does Something. Sister Trope to Sword of Plot Advancement

Examples of Villain-Beating Artifact include:

Film

• Kubo and the Two Strings: The titular character and his companions must find three weapons, the "Sword Unbreakable," "Breastplace Impenetrable," and "Helmet " in order to defeat the Moon King Kubo has little to no training on how to use these weapons. So, he took a third option and uses his shamisen instead to defeat the Moon King.

Literature

• In Mistborn. This is double subverted. Since the metals are used in the Magic System, ten are known to bestow powers. Kelsier made rumors of the Eleventh Metal that has powers to defeat the Lord Ruler, when Vin tries to use it, it's shown her intangible images of people who used to be. The second time, Vin uses it, she realizes that the Lord Ruler is not the one who everyone thinks he was, uses this knowledge to take out his Immortality Inducer. No Immortal Inertia ensues.
• His Dark Materials: Subverted this. The subtle knife was claimed several times to be used as the only weapon capable of killing God, the supposedly Big Bad of this series. The knife's owner was encourage to take it to the guy opposing God, so he can win. Turns out that God was too old and senile and eventually dies of old age. In addition, not much of Big Bad material.
• Gardner F. Fox's "Niall of the Far Travels"'s "Out of the Eons," a short story. Adonair, an alternate universe evil deity, tries to enslave humanity and conquer the world. The gods can't destroy him but manages to trap him. Niall accidentally releases Adonair at the story's beginning. The only way to get rid of Adonair is for Niall to drink a special liquid and trick Adonair into possessing his body.

Live-Action Television

• Supernatural
  • Samuel Colt made a special Colt gun and bullets. This gun can be used to kill almost anything. - Except Lucifer.
  • There's a special dagger which can kill demons (and the humans that they possess at the time). Regular knives and daggers don't work, it's just the host body. It's backstory has yet to appear.
  • In one episode, the dragon can only be killed by a sword that's forged by the blood of another dragon.

Dean: "So, you need one sword to kill one dragon, but you got to kill one dragon to make one sword. How does this work out?"

• In Buffy the Vampire Slayer had some of these moments - Like Thor's Hammer, that's used to whomp Glory down to size.
  • Also an ancient scythe that's Caleb's Achilles Heel.
• Doctor Who: Subverted. In one episode, "Last of the Time Lords." Which has Martha Jones spending a whole year searching for a weapon which was separated into four parts that can defeat the Master, revealing at the end that the Villain-Beating Artifact was just a ruse merely to distract from Martha's real objective.
• Once Upon a Time twisted this trope. The only way to defeat the Big Bad is to steal his dagger, but you'll replace the Big Bad as the new one.
• In Madan Senki Ryukendo, it's stated in the Kanon of Light that only to defeat DaiMaOh, they need three Ultimate Keys.

Video Games

• In Grow RPG, this trope was distilled down to its molecular essence. Besides the sword and armor, you will need the special blue orb which can knock the Big Bad's life meter down to where you can go man to man. (It's not possible to reach the Big Bag without it).
• In Chrono Cross, you can kill the Time Devourer using force alone, but it'll come back eventually. The only way to defeat it once and for all is to use the Chrono Cross.
• God of War, whatever is contained within Pandora's Box has power that capable of killing a god (Hint: It's the only thing). So Kratos spends the first game to find and open the box, that way he can off Ares. In God of War 3, he needs it again to defeat Zeus...He was lied to, since the box was empty the last time he opened it.
• Warcraft 3: Not a specific weapon, but mainly a damage type. Divine armor's weakness is Chaos, which is reserved for Hell's legions or insanely strong monsters. In order to defeat, Cenarius, an invulnerable demigod, Grom Hellscream's orcs reactivate some sort of demon pact, this allows them to defeat him (By giving them Chaos damage).
  • Also, Illidan, who devours the Skull of Guldan, which the Legion were using earlier to spread corruption in the Night Elves' forests. This turns him into a half-demon, but the bonus is an ability to defeat Tichondrius.
  • Someone told Prince Arthas, that to defeat Mal'Ganis, the dreadlord, he must search for the Frostmourne, a legendary sword. Once Arthas got it, he then confronts, the dreadlord. Mal'Ganis laughs and states he fell into their trap, and to add to the sucky-ness, the sword consumed Arthas's soul. While it's true, Arthas's real master is the Lich King, who seems to serve the Burning Legion and has his personal agendas. Arthas was then order to and does slay Mal'Ganis.
• Neverwinter Nights 2, the only way to injure and even kill the King of Shadows, was to find the Silver Sword of Gith. But it was broken into several shards when it was used earlier and your character ain't the only one interested in collecting them.
• In the original Doom 3, the player uses the Soul Cube to defeat Cyberdemon. The smaller ones, however, aren't limited to this type of weakness. Also, the Soul Cube powers up by using the souls of fallen enemies. Subverted, in patches.
• In Legend of Zelda, most of the games, has Link needing the Master Sword to defeat Ganon.
  • In the Phantom Hourglass, Link needs the Phantom Sword to defeat Bellum.
  • Also, the Silver Arrows.
• In Baldur's Gate 2, the way that the Unseeing Eye was advertised in this matter and you'll need a special rod of destruction to defeat him. Actually, it's easier (though less profitable) to just kill his followers until he appears. Since the Unseeing Eye is just a standard mage with more hit points than usual and less dangerous.
• Colobot, the only way to defeat the alien queen was to find and use the Phazer Shooter. But to acquire it, you'll need to collect four keys and to open the vault.
• The Fire Emblem series uses this trope too many times to count. Even using the titular Fire Emblem occasionally (or not using it, depends on the game).
  • In Fire Emblem Gaiden has its own Falchion, which is the only thing that can kill off Duma once and for all (Besides using the Cleric's Nosferatu spell, which is a bug in the original game maybe).
  • In Fire Emblem Genealogy of Holy War which has the Falchion substitute in the form of the Naga spell: In-Universe, it's treated as one, but on a gameplay standpoint the Naga spell isn't necessary to defeat the Final Boss (Good luck beating him without it).

Western Animation

• Samurai Jack, the titular character's sword is the predominately the only weapon to take out Aku, because of its Made of Good.
• In Adventure Time, the gauntlet that Billy owns has the power to seal the Lich. Unfortunately, the bad guy destroyed it before Finn can make good use of it. Finn has to resort to using the Power of Liking Someone A Lot, just to destroy its physical form.
• In Scooby Doo Mystery Inc, Scoob and his friends found out that they need to find and use the Heart of the Jaguar to destroy the Crystal Sarcophagus, because Annuaki was sealed in it. During the final episode, The real "Heart of the Jaguar" wasn't the crystal spearhead (which got destroyed earlier), it's The Power of Friendship which binds the gang together. This and teamwork were used and Scooby use the spearshaft to shatter the sarcophagus.