Rayse

Rayse
by Matthew Johnson
Died	1175, killed by Taravangian using Nightblood
Abilities	Shard of Odium
Titles	Odium, King of gods, God
Aliases	Nun Raylisi, Rasan
Homeworld	Yolen
Universe	Cosmere
First Appeared	Oathbringer

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“I know pain. I am the only god who does. The only one who cares. ”

—Rayse

Rayse was the first Vessel of the Shard Odium. He died at some point during Vev 1175, slain by Taravangian with Nightblood.

Appearance and Personality

by Ralf Melevo

Appearance

For more images, see /Gallery.

While Odium’s true essence is too powerful to be seen, Rayse generally presents himself as an old man with a wide, furrowed face and bone-white hair sweeping back from his head, and thick mustaches with a hint of black in them blended into a short white beard. His skin and eyes look Shin, that is to say, he has pale skin and lacks epicanthic folds, and he wears a golden crown in his powdery hair.

To the singers, on the other hand, he appears as an ancient singer with gold and white marbled skin. He carries a golden sceptre in both of these forms.

When Dalinar claims to have seen Odium, Rayse shows him an enormous, all-encompassing white-and-red flame emanating human emotion, chiefly hatred and anger.

Personality

“Rayse... was among the most loathsome, crafty, and dangerous individuals I had ever met. ”

—Hoid

Mortal

Prior to Ascension, Rayse was already thought of as cunning, ambitious, and very dangerous. He was driven to kill Adonalsium to achieve his goals and desires.

His personality was such to lead him to pick up the Shard of Odium, indicating that his personality was aligned with hatred and strong emotions. He wished to become the type of person he came to be after holding the Shard.

by taratjah

Vessel

He picked his Shard very deliberately, believing that it matches him perfectly, and desires nothing less than to be the sole god of the cosmere. To this end, he seeks to destroy any other Shard, primarily those capable of rivaling or threatening him. To protect himself from a counterattack by other Shards, he picks the targets that he can claim have broken the rules that all the Vessels had previously agreed on. This being said, he's not opposed to cooperating with his fellow Vessels if it suits him.

He can be extremely cunning. He will often present himself as grandfatherly and friendly, a helping hand rather than a wicked overlord. He will carry this facade for a long time, even if whoever's talking to him is keenly aware of his real nature. He will praise his interlocutor effusively, attempting to present himself as a reasonable ally. On the other hand, when things do not go his way, the facade drops, and he's quick to reassert a position of dominance, growing callous and threatening. If it turns out the situation is beyond his ability to control, he'll flee to regroup and try another day.

While careful and subtle, Rayse is also an arrogant man. He can be lonely with nobody to share his accomplishments and likes to show off and enjoys being worshipped. This can be seen when he pulls people into a vision, presenting himself as a powerful, dominating figure while this is not really necessary. Furthermore, he hates being questioned, leading to a struggle between his mind and the Shard he holds, for Odium craves questions and arguments.

In addition, he strongly believes that Odium is the Shard of Passion, not hatred.^{[citation needed]} He sees passion and emotions as a very important aspect of the lives of men, seeing them as what defines a person. He sees beauty in passion, and greatly respects those that led their passions consume them unrestrained. He even encourages this, inspiring them to give in to all of their strongest emotions. He also respects straightforwardness in one's emotions. His respect for such things is enough that he would willingly barter with people he considers passionate enough, despite his megalomania. He even respects the Knights Radiant for their honesty and willingness to do what they thought was best, despite their resistance against him. This respect for honesty is a common thread in his interactions with others, as he also respects Taravangian's honesty.

He is willing to grant people liberty from an oppressive master if it means that they would come to serve him, such as when he granted mind and freedom to slaveform singers, so that they could assist him and his Fused in their fight to claim Roshar and free him from the Rosharan system.^{[citation needed]} He, however, is not a kind master to these peoples, using them as vessels to be possessed by his Fused. He also strictly punishes disobedience in any form, and as mentioned previously, is angered by his orders or actions being questioned by those he deems inferior.

Following from his beliefs regarding passion and emotions, he believes a world without such things as not being worth living in. He also believes himself the only Vessel to truly understand pain and emotion, and the only one to truly care about mankind. He wants to take away the pain of sapient beings, to take away their guilt for their actions. To allow them to fully indulge in their emotions and passions without having to feel the weight of pain or guilt. Offers to take away the pain are one of his primary methods of getting people to turn to him, as he preys on their pain, guilt, and insecurities.^{[citation needed]} However, despite his claims to love mankind, he considers the lives of humans and singers of inherently lesser value than his own, and looks down upon them.

While willing to compliment people for their accomplishments, such as complimenting Taravangian for the creation of the Diagram, he often tries to immediately upstage said accomplishments; this is likely motivated by his own megalomania and belief in the inferiority of mortals.

Furthermore, he is a traitorous individual, as he is willing to double-cross those that he works with, such as Autonomy, if it means achieving his goals. He also betrays his followers, as previously mentioned, seducing them with promises of new forms, only to allow them to be possessed by Fused. However, he holds to his Oaths, as he is incapable of breaking them.

His greatest desire is to escape the Rosharan system from which he is bound, so that he could continue his series of Splinterings around the cosmere, so that he could achieve his telos of becoming its sole ruler. He is willing to do whatever he can, or take however long is required, in order to achieve this goal. Spending around seven-thousand years in his endeavors. He is also willing to kill those he respects and feels don't deserve to die, if it means furthering his goals; be it escaping from Roshar, or becoming the sole god. However, upon being forced into a corner by Dalinar Kholin, he agreed to give up his wish for freedom, deigning to accept sole leadership over Roshar, so long as he had the freedom to send his soldiers across the cosmere in a greater war for control. Thus he was willing to give up his freedom, but not his lust for power and control. He was infuriated by his wishes not being granted in the Oath, but ultimately accepted as he felt he had no other choice.

Moreover, he fears losing himself by taking up other Shards and thus becoming warped by them. Due to this, he attempts to Splinter Shards rather than absorbing them into himself.

He presents himself as a regal king, donning a golden crown and staff, reflective of his desires and how he views himself. He even uses his regal staff when presenting himself to the Singers, likely as a display of authority.

Abilities

Rayse is a Vessel of a Shard, with all the abilities this entails, including the power to create a magic system by Investing into a world, and is functionally immortal.

Apart from the magic systems his Shard fuels, Rayse is capable of perceiving the future. How good he is at it is uncertain; while his abilities exceed that of Honor or Taravangian's Diagram, he still has blind spots, mostly pertaining to other seers, and he can be wrong. He's also able to corrupt and subvert the Investiture of others, and force a connection to himself, though the latter requires a proper mental state in the recipient.

Unlike Ati, Rayse is unable to use Odium to alter text documents. This is because unlike Scadrial, which was created partly with Ruin's own power, Roshar was not suffused with Odium's Investiture.

Rayse knows how to kill and splinter other Shards without getting killed or splintered himself. It is unclear whether Odium has some unique skill or attribute enhancing his ability to do this or whether all Shards are capable of these actions, given the right motivation.

History

Rayse had once been a human from the planet Yolen. He participated in the Shattering of Adonalsium along with fifteen other people, and chose the Shard of Odium for himself. Afterwards, much like the other Shards, he departed the planet. While his Shard was interpreted as Odium from the very beginning, it's uncertain if the series of killings he would subsequently go on was his plan from the start.

For the subsequent events, see Odium#History.

Relationships

Autonomy

He was working with Autonomy to an unclear extent. Had he not been captured in the Rosharan system, he would have double-crossed them, attacking and trying to Splinter them.

by Wanda Sonnemann

Dalinar facing off with Rayse

Dalinar

“Don't blame yourself. I made you kill her, Dalinar. I caused all of this. Do you remember? ”

—Rayse to Dalinar

Rayse has been grooming Dalinar to be his champion from a young age. During the war of Alethi unification, Odium provided him with the Thrill, and he claims to be the influence behind Dalinar's most gruesome atrocities, including the burning of the Rift. His goal is to make Dalinar feel such overwhelming guilt that he would give Rayse his pain, willingly joining his cause. When Cultivation wiped Dalinar's memories, Rayse's plan became to return them all to Dalinar at once, for the greatest possible impact.

By the time of the True Desolation, Rayse is confident in his ability to pull Dalinar over to his side when the time comes. He puts on a warm and caring facade, acting as though he's Dalinar's friend while at the same time underscoring just how thoroughly his Dalinar is. Likewise, at the Battle of Thaylen Field he's similarly friendly as he offers Dalinar an out from his overwhelming feelings of guilt, even as Dalinar attempts to deny him.

What Rayse doesn't expect is that Cultivation has arranged for Dalinar to recover his memories beforehand, giving him time to work through them and greatly dulling the impact Rayse's sudden influx of memories has on Dalinar. This allows Dalinar to reject Rayse's offer. Rayse is first stunned, and then terrified as Dalinar not only defies him, but progresses on the path of a Bondsmith and summons Honor's Perpendicularity. He flees, fearing that if they met face to face again, Dalinar could push him into a contest in which Rayse's victory wouldn't be certain.

Hoid

“Cephandrius. Ever the rat. No matter where I go, there he is, scratching in the wall. Burrowing into my strongholds. He could have been a god, yet he insists on living in the dirt. ”

—Rayse on Hoid

Rayse and Hoid were friends, once. However, at some point the relationship between the two of them soured significantly, leaving Hoid with a deep grudge that would last for thousands of years. Hoid seems to have a long history of conspiring and working against Rayse, and they bear deep hatred towards each other. Presently, Rayse is one of the few people in the cosmere Hoid is terrified of, and though he initially came to Roshar chasing after Rayse, he now wants to avoid him as best as he can. Moreover, he's attempting to muster support among other Shards, as well as Frost, to help deal with Odium. His efforts have not yielded much success.

Rayse seems to be aware of Hoid's presence on Roshar; at the very least, he knows that Hoid will attempt to stop him. However, he doesn't consider this to be a significant problem, believing that he can outsmart him. This does not mean he ignores him, as Hoid ponders while sneaking around in an occupied Kholinar that if Rayse knew where he was, Rayse would not hesitate to level the city.

Taravangian

“ So honest, this version of you... I much prefer it, yes. There is a straightforwardness to your Passion. ”

— Rayse to Taravangian

He respects the straightforwardness of Taravangian's passion.^[expand]

Taravangian himself hates Rayse, enough so that he was led to murder the Vessel.^[expand]

Tanavast

“Tell me you've never found yourself in conflict with someone you respect. Tell me you’ve never killed a man because you had to, even if—in a better world—he shouldn’t deserve it? ”

—Rayse on killing Tanavast

The relation between Rayse and Tanavast is difficult to determine, moreso for the fact that Rayse is the only source of information on it. On one hand, Rayse claims to sincerely respect him as a person, and claims that in a better world, Tanavast needn't have died. On the other hand, he also claims that Tanavast was heartless, caring for bonds and oaths more than the people behind them. Tanavast's opinion of Rayse is unknown, but he was clearly wary, as he deliberately constructed their confrontation in a way that would allow him to bind Rayse to Braize.

Trivia

• Rayse would get along well with Torol Sadeas.

Notes

Preceded by None

Vessel of Odium

Succeeded by Taravangian

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