Sullivan Knoth

"Give them the knife, the club, the fist if it's all you got! God rejoices in the spilling of wicked blood!"

- "Papa" Sullivan Knoth

"My lord... I've taken care of my children. But yours... I am powerless against. The child's too strong already. You've murdered paradise. God has gone silent. Since the storm. The birth. Who will he have? If he destroys us all? Who will he have left to punish? I killed my children. All of them. Every last one. There's no more perfect faith than that. And still, God is silent. Kill that child if you can. If you love anything at all, crush its skull under your heel. I know God doesn't hear dead men. But I expect he answers them..."

- Knoth's delusional monologue before commiting suicide Sullivan Knoth is one of the two main antagonists (along with Val) in the 2017 videogame Outlast 2.

Knoth is the founder and leader of the Testament of the New Ezekiel, a fanatic group of cultists who have made their home in Temple Gate, a remote town in the wilderness of Arizona. When journalist Blake Langermann arrives with his wife Lynn to investigate a murder, they arrive at Temple Gate where they eventually cross paths with Knoth and his fanatical followers.

He is voiced by Vlasta Vrána.

Past
Knoth was born in 1933 and eventually became a shoe salesman in Albuquerque. However, he assembled a lot of debts and was about to lose his home. Seeing no way out of his problems, Knoth at some point started listening to an evangelical radio station but did not find it comforting or consoling at all. Nevertheless, he kept listening to the station and eventually started hearing a different voice coming from the radio, claiming to be the voice of God.

From this voice, Knoth learned that "God" was not content with the religious/spiritual situation on Earth, claiming that a new prophet was needed in order to satisfy God and to bring balance. Believing himself to be said prophet, Knoth then experienced an apocalyptic vision with a terrible creature in it. Witnessing this vision, Knoth believed that the end of the world was nea and was informed by the voice that the apocalypse would indeed arrive during Knoth's lifetime. He was informed that it was up to him to lead a group of a chosen few towards paradise instead of eternal damnation. Fueled by his new calling, Knoth started preaching to the people of Albuquerque, having abandoned all his possessions with belonged to the bank anyhow. Some started listening and within a year, Sullivan had amassed a group of followers which were fanatically dedeicated to him. They also donated all their worldly possessions to Knoth's newly-founded "Testament of the New Ezekiel". Knoth kept receiving messages from "God" which he recorded in the "Gospel of Knoth".

One of his followers was the wealthy woman Lydia Degan who owned a luxurious ranch. Knoth made that ranch to the comunal headquarter of the Testament of the New Ezekiel. Living on the ranch with his followers, Knoth encouraged sexual intercourse between his followers, even "donating" his own semen to the course. He personally delivered each baby, knowing that one of them would carry a secret pivotal to the salvation of humanity.

However, the police, who were after Knoth for some time, used the home births as a reason to finally take down the Testament. They swept down onto the ranch and arrested several cult members but Knoth and a handful of his most loyal followers evaded capture. Despite their escape, the assets of the Testament were frozen which almost destroyed Knoth's church for good. In the most dire hour, Knoth went onto a mountain to receive guidance of God in a similar fashion of Moses and Abraham. Indeed, after wating in the wilderness naked for some time, Knoth heard the voice of God which demanded an eyeball in exchange for true vision. Knoth cut out his left eye immediately.

Immediately after his eye was pierced, Knoth received a hallucination of a town hidden in the wilderness which would be the "gateway to the true temple of the Testament of the New Ezekiel". Thus, Knoth prepared his remaining followers and decided to built the town he saw, deep in the wilderness of Arizona - far away from prying eyes. In the winter of 1969, Sullivan and over hundred of his followers left civilization for good and headed into the wilderness, to the town that Knoth would name Temple Gate.

During the events of Outlast 2, Knoth and the Testament have already lived at Temple Gate for years. Meanwhile, Knoth and the communion have killed all children, even the unborn ones, as Knoth had prophecied that one of them would be the antichrist born into the world.

Outlast 2
When investigative journalist Lynn Langermann and her husband Blake investigate a murder of a pregnant woman, they fly with a helicopter. The helicopter crashes, stranding Lynn and Blake in the wilderness of Arizona, close to Temple Gate. Lynn is eventually captured by the Testament and delivered to Knoth. When Knoth realizes that Lynn is pregnant, he examines her and finds her unborn child to be the prophecied anti-christ. Meanwhile, Blake, who survived the accident as well, sneaks into Temple Gate to save Lynn from the cult. Eventually, Lynn either escapes or is thrown out of the chapel by the Testament. She is found by Blake and the two attempt to flee the town. However, Lynn is still weak from Knoth's examination and is deeply traumatized. While the Langermann's flee, Knoth contacts Temple Gate via the town's loudspeaker system and warns all inhabitants that Lynn and Blake are on the loose, carrying the antichrist. Knoth tells his followers to find and kill all three of them in order to prevent the antichrist to be born.

After sending the town to hunt Blake, Knoth has captured heretics brought to his church, intending to deal with his enemies.

After Blake has evaded the townsfolk, he arrives at a big cathedral where he finds a man strapped on a wheel. The man claims that Blake needs to kill him, as Knoth will soon come back with a relative of the man. Knoth plans to harm the girl in order to make the man talk. Thus, the man begs Blake for mercy. However, before Blake can do anything, Knoth returns with the woman. Blake is forced to hide but can observe the situation. Knoth rants about the situation, claiming that Val took Lynn, the "woman that harbors the antichrist", and that they do not have much time to find her again. After the man breaks under the torture of his relative and reveals where Val and the Heretics are hiding, Knoth has both him and the woman executed by his henchmen. After both are dead, Knoth leaves the church with his followers.

After having learned that Val and the Heretics have brought Lynn to their secret headquarter in the mines, Knoth and his force immediately set out to retrieve her. Blake, having heard the location as well, tries to get to the mines before Knoth can but when Blake arrives, Knoth's followers have already attacked one of the outposts. When Blake finally arrives at Lynn's location, Knoth's followers suddenly burst in and attack, forcing Blake to flee together with Lynn.

Together with Lynn, Blake takes shelter in Sullivan's chapel when an apocalyptic storm comes up. During the storm, Lynn gives birth to their child but dies immediately afterwards. Blake faints from grief and when he regains consciousness, Knoth is sitting on a bench next to him with a dagger in his hand. He claims that the child is too strong already and that Blake has murdered paradise. He claims that since the storm and the birth, God has gone silent. Wondering who God will punish if he kills all of mankind, Sullivan then laments that he even killed all his children - meaning his followers whom he murdered outside the chapel - for God and that there could be no more perfect faith than his. Knoth tells Blake to kill the child if he loves anything at all and then slits his own throat - leaving him to suffocate on his own blood.