Collector

"Dark figure locked inside the Tower of Love. Preserves Hallownest's creatures in glass jars with particular attention given to Grubs. A shadow that sometimes flits through the caverns, making strange noises to itself. I've never seen it clearly so I have no idea what type of creature it is."

The Collector is a hidden boss in Hollow Knight. Defeating it grants the the Collector's Map.

The Collector is a Void creature resembling a Kingsmould without its armour but displaying a completely different behaviour. It lives hidden away in the locked Tower of Love, among a large collection of bugs collected throughout Hallownest and preserved in glass jars, dead or alive.

While always displaying a joyous demeanour, the Collector is only concerned by the preservation of other creatures. It trapped the Grubs from the Forgotten Crossroads colony and recorded their location throughout Hallownest on a map. Despite its attention to them, it only has three within its tower. It also has a connection to the previous owner of the Love Tower's key, a Hallownest aristocrat bug found dead deep within the Queen's Gardens.

The Collector can be heard laughing outside the padded door of the Tower of Love. When reaching its room, it leaps from the ceiling to attack the Knight. If the Knight dies to the Collector, their Shade will be found trapped in a glass jar before its fight room. When defeated, Void particles erupt from the Collector as its final laugh dies out. Then its body falls to the floor and collapses in black liquid.

Behaviour and Tactics
The Collector uses a series of attacks and manoeuvres mainly focused on spawning minions:


 * Jar: leaps into the "ceiling" (or floor above), causing glass jars to rain down on the Knight. The glass jars fall from random positions in the ceiling. The jars do not break when they hit the Knight but they do contact damage. Instead, the jars shatter when they hit the ground and each glass jar randomly lets out 1 of 3 enemies: Vengeflies, Baldurs and Aspid Hunters. There is a noise for each glass jar that will be coming down and can be used to determine the number of jars that will fall, along with a puff of dust signifying at which positions they will fall. This noise sounds like wooden wind chimes collapsing. When all of the glass jars are done falling, the Collector drops back down.
 * Grab: leaps towards The Knight's position and make grabbing motions, dealing contact damage.
 * Hop: The Collector's method of traversing the arena, jumps in equal increments really fast with its hands raised. There is a set limit of hops the Collector can do before doing another attack.

Jars
The number of jars that the Collector drops depends on the Phase and the summons still alive. After reaching 300 health the Collector will transition into Phase 2.

The Collector drops jars when there are 3 summons or less. When there are 4 or more summons it stops dropping jars.


 * Phase 1: The Collector can drop 1-2 jars at once. The max summon count is 5.


 * Phase 2: The Collector can drop 2-3 jars at once. The max summon count is 6.

The Collector erratically jumps around the room, avoiding attacks. The main threat in the battle comes from the Jar Attack and the creatures they spawn. The Collector itself does not give SOUL unless hit by weaverlings (when Grubsong is equipped) or with the Dream Nail. This makes gathering SOUL a particular challenge during the fight.

As the fight progresses, the Collector gets faster and more aggressive. Be careful with healing, as the Collector is fast, and its movement pattern can be difficult to read. Be wary of its Grab attack, although it does not use it too often.

It is easy to damage the Collector, getting three or four hits in as it stays close to the ground and rarely performs grab attacks. It is recommended to get the Coiled Nail first as this makes it possible to kill the enemies it spawns in one hit, although equipping Fragile Strength when using the Channeled Nail is also a viable strategy. Nail Arts maximize the damage done to The Collector.

After dealing 750 damage to The Collector and effectively defeating it, it will lean over as if staggered and stay there in place slowly chuckling. An additional 15 hits are required to finish the fight once it is in this state.

Location
The Collector is locked in the Tower of Love, which can only be accessed using the Love Key, found in the Queen's Gardens. The Tower can only be entered from the deep lift shaft between Kingdom's Edge and the City of Tears. An exit to King's Station can be accessed after flipping a switch.

Trivia

 * The Nature of the Collector is very detached from the general nature of other beings made from Void.
 * It is exempt from the effect Void Heart has on other Void beings.
 * It has a voice and independent thoughts, as opposed to them.
 * Within the Tower of Love, there is a secret area that can be accessed by jumping into a hidden gap within the ceiling along the hallway of the grubs. This reveals a mysterious piece of art known only as the "Vitruvian Grub".
 * When the Collector is fought during a Pantheon in Godhome, a distorted version of "Gods & Glory" is played, in reference to the original fight having a distorted version of "Decisive Battle".

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