So Rayse’s writeup has a bunch of issues, including incorrect information, not really characterizing him well, and some very notable missing crimes, needing a significant rewrite. This will be long given there a lot to cover.
- The Stormlight Archive: Rayse, the Vessel of the Shard of Odium, is a stern, tyrannical man who made it his mission to hunt down and sunder the other Shardborn. Heedless of who gets in his way, Rayse is willing to burn entire worlds to shatter the rest, having murdered those seen as "The Almighty" in the process while sowing his dark influence on worlds to create war and bloodshed until he can conquer or raze it to nothing. On the world where the series is set, Rayse's influence is responsible for the mental lobotomies and enslavement of the Parshendi race, the massive wars and the corruption of many others with his own Fused being little more than slaves he will send to eternal damnation for failure. Arriving himself, Rayse intends to slaughter everything in the world until all that is left are him and his own twisted armies, a process he will repeat through the cosmos.
A bit of a note on what to call him, Shard Vessels get called by the name of their shard, which would be Odium, however to avoid confusion since the Shard Odium itself is its own thing, and there’s Rayse’s successor, Taravangian, also going by Odium now, just going to refer to the two Shard Vessels by their names, and only the Shard as Odium.
So first to start with some things that aren't quite right, or just straight up wrong:
Some errors and other oddities with the writeup
- It is ridiculously inaccurate to say Rayse was responsible for the lobotomy and enslavement of the Parshendi. That happened midway through the time he was sealed away. It was caused by accident when a subordinate tried to connect to the Singers, only to get sealed by human forces, causing the Singers minds to break. Not wanting to waste all these now obedient creatures they had, humanity opted to enslave them. It was Rayse’s lack of presence that caused this, and when he comes back he actually connects to the Singers, giving them their intelligence back and allowing them to escape slavery.
- If you're wondering if this is redeeming, it's not. He only wants the Singers to build a power base with, and doesn’t care about them. Also many of his actions make it clear Rayse is no friend to the Singers. He's pretty much responsible for every other problem they face.
- Also to note a terminology error in the writeup, and to define these terms since they’ll come up later, Parshedi is an Alethi word for a group of a race the Alethi call Parsh, whose proper name is the Singers, and the Parshendi are a group of Singers who call themselves the Listeners who defected and did not connect during the False Desolation, making them the only Singers who were not lobotomized and enslaved. The Listeners then made their own civilization in isolation.
- Also while the Fused are pretty much slaves, there’s no mention of Rayse eternally torturing them for failure, he resurrects them endlessly. Eternal damnation comes out when they try to defect, not fail. It's also not clear if he's ever done this more than the one occasion we see.
- The writeup overstates Rayse’s influence on planets outside Roshar. We only know of two he influenced, outside of the Rosharan system where Stormlight takes place, and only by collateral damage, one not badly at all, one VERY badly, with no mention of him starting wars or influencing people there. Basically Rayse just wanted to kill the Shards there, did, and left. It's unclear if he even had subordinates before Roshar, since its noted that Rayse was shifting to subtler methods because of him becoming the Shardic equivalent of Dented Iron after his fights. It's only in Roshar where we see him influence people and start wars.
- Rayse dying and not being the Big Bad of the Cosmere is probably the biggest plot twist in the whole thing, so Disc-One Final Boss should probably not be his name pothole. Satanic Archetype doesn't have spoilers, and also describes his character.
- "The Almighty" is weirdly highlighted, as only Honor was called that (who Rayse did kill), and the name has no particular significance to Rayse.
Also I just want to note Rayse’s characterization. The writeup only frames him as a crazed Omnicidal Maniac, which while not completely incorrect, isn’t quite right. He's hyped up to act like that, and the Shard Odium is like that (in a sense, as its a force of nature), but the story deliberately makes a point of having Rayse act notably different than expected. He's a lot more pragmatic and is majorly Faux Affably Evil. Most relevant is that the writeup states his goal is to wipe out all life on Roshar, which is directly contradicted by Rayse himself, when he and Dalinar are negotiating terms for a Combat by Champion to end the war between their two factions.
Rhythm of War, Chapter 112
- Rayse: Do you know why I make men fight, Dalinar? Why I created the Thrill? Why I encourage the wars?Dalinar: To destroy us.Rayse: Why would I want to destroy you? I am your god, Dalinar. I need soldiers. For the true battle that is coming, not one for one people or one miserable windswept continent. A battle for the gods. A battle for everything. Roshar is a training ground. The time will come that I unleash you upon the others who are not nearly as well trained. Not nearly as hardened as I have made you.[...]Rayse: If your champion wins, I will step away for a thousand years. I will retreat to Braize, and I will no longer speak to, contact, or influence the Fused or Voidspren. But I cannot contain them. And you will have to pray that your descendants are as lucky as you are, as I will be less...lenient when I return. [Dalinar goes to speak, Rayse interrupts] Let me finish, in exchange for you giving up one thing you wanted note , I will give up my grand plans for Roshar. I will leave this planet for a thousand years, and abandon all I've worked for here. I give you and the singers freedom to make your own peace. Freedom for you, and freedom for me. This is all I ask for my victory: As you represent Honor, you can relax his prohibitions for me. No matter what happens in the contest, you never have to worry about me again. All I want is away from this miserable system.
So in summary Rayse is Despotism Justifies the Means type villain, not an Omnicidal Maniac, let alone having specific intent to slaughter everything on Roshar. He's literally willing to abandon it without salvaging anything, because being stuck in one place has a tendency to stall plans of galactic conquest.
Also a note on the negotiation, he is being completely truthful about his terms, but this is purely pragmatic. He needs a magical contract like the one being negotiated for what's sealing him in the Rosharan system to be removed, and for that to work both parties need to understand completely the terms, and breaking those terms can result in lethal consequences, even for a god like Rayse. Also, this contract is central to the plot, as the heroes don't believe they can defeat Rayse, instead trying to seal him away again. Now, the writeup framing him as purely as an uninhibited oncoming storm, and not a Sealed Evil in a Can entity scheming his way out, and is an oncoming storm through the culmination of those schemes, isn't the biggest thing in terms of CM status, it just doesn't contextualize him quite right, which I feel should be corrected.
Now for the actual main reason for this, while Rayse did not turn out to be the Big Bad, he was still given the deeds of one. And one of those Big Bads.To put it simply the current writeup is a bit vague and undersells Rayse, when it could get a lot more visceral and explicit.
And yes, this will be long.
A (mostly) complete list of Rayse's deeds
- Rayse went to the planet Sel, and killed the two shards there, Devotion and Dominion, shattering their power so it couldn't be used ever again, and in the process turning Sel's cognitive realm into a hellish storm.
- Don't know if this should be described in detail, as while its plot relevant, the incident isn't the most heinous. While torching Sel's cognitive realm makes it exceptionally difficult for people to get there (planetary travel is done through the cognitive realm), it didn't effect the people living on the planet proper that much. Sel's one of the most earth like planets in the Cosmere, which has quite a few Death Worlds, with thriving civilizations.
- Rayse fought the Shard Ambition over Threnody, the Shard Mercy joined in as well...in some way. The battle twisted everything on Thernody, Ambition fled, and Rayse finished her off somewhere else.
- This should be explicitly described on the writeup. While there's still a lot unexplained about it, such as anything to do with Mercy's involvement, Rayse is treated as the primary initiator, and Threnody has a serious contention for biggest Death World in the Cosmere thanks a whole novella detailing how bad it is...despite not showing the absolute worst parts of the planet, and this fight is to blame for that. It's the go to horror-story in the Cosmere when describing how destructive Shards can be, and why Rayse should never be allowed to leave Roshar.
- And this is just the place where Ambition was mortally wounded. We don't know what happened to the place where they died.
- Rayse turns up in the Rosharan system, to kill Honor and Cultivation. He makes himself the god of the planet Ashyn, where humans lived, and manipulates one into dangerous experiments with Surges. This goes wrong, as Rayse planned, and turns Ashyn into a Death World. Very few humans still live on Ashyn, and many have to flee to the planet Roshar, where the Singers, who worshiped Honor and Cultivation, live.
- Just to note that the timeline before Rayse arrives in the Rosharan system is very unclear, and hasn't been fully explained, there will likely be reveals of Rayse doing things in between Threnody and Roshar.
- It's not been completely explained what happened next, other than that war broke out between Humans and Singers. The Singers lost, and humans became the dominant species on Roshar. Somehow Shard allegiances swapped, as Honor and Cultivation began supporting humans, while the furious Singers went to Rayse, who offered revenge for what the humans did. The most elite Singers became the Fused.
- It's not particularly clear if Rayse started the war. He probably did, and either way he was the reason humans were there to start a conflict.
- This and the previous point are the inciting incident of the Stormlight Archive, they should be described directly in the writeup.
- The Fused don't have it to well. There are always resurrected, losing a bit of their sanity each time. Some have only minor effects, but some of gone completely insane. We see one Fused put a lot of effort to find a way to make themselves Deader than Dead so they don't inevitably those their mind eventually. And of course Resignations Not Accepted under penalty of eternal torture...though its important to note again, that its not clear if Rayse has ever done that any time other than the one Fused defection we see. Also for the Fused to resurrect, every time they must take the body of a Singer, kill them in the process.
- Then comes the Desolations, when Rayse waged war on humanity, and therefore Honor and Cultivation. Each one was a war several years long, with horrific damage. One account we get after a Desolation mentions a kingdom who took the brunt of the assault lose ninety percent of its population, several other kingdoms got wiped off the map, nearly every family had lost half its members, and civilization was on the verge of collapse. This is pretty typical for a Desolation, and there were a bit more than a dozen of them. The damage accrued over time and the once pre-industrial civilizations had been sent back to the stone age by the end.
- I don't think I need to explain why the current writeup doesn't quite explain how bad these were.
- A note on how Desolations started and ended. The Heralds sealed him away to end them, and to break his seal Rayse tortured them until they gave in and released him, which could be centuries. The Heralds eventually gave up and left one of their own, Taln, who had never given in, to seal Rayse by himself. It took Rayse 4500 years to find another way to unseal himself, but that isn't from a lack of torturing Taln that whole time. Taln pretty much an Empty Shell by the time of the series.
- The most uniquely horrible crime Rayse has, and plot revelvant. Very notable omission on the current writeup.
- During this time he was able to get release one of his Unmade, Nergaoul, onto Roshar. It has the effect of turning everyone in its vicinity into a rampaging brute. The Alethi got a particularly notable exposure that resulted in them gaining "The Thrill" in battle, which has the effect of basically making intense combat addictive. The results are predictable.
- At the start of the series a subordinate, Ulim, schemes to send the Listeners into a war with the Alethi, before tricking them into taking forms of power than brainwash them into summoning the Everstorm, and therefore Odium. It's not clear how much Rayse had to do with Ulim's schemes, but Rayse definitely did use the Everstorm, which he directly controls to wipe up the Listeners, because they were Singers with a culture independent of him, and he can't have that. The few survivors were rounded up and "rewarded" by being used as vessels for the Fused. Rayse spare one, Venli, to spread the word amongst the newly un-lobotmised Singer of the Listeners "noble sacrifice". When she starts going through the motions Rayse puts Venli of a vision of her being slowly vaporized by a star, with fully simulated pain, to make sure she knows she needs to propagandize better.
- This is a very uniquely heinous series of events, (I'm just waiting for Ulim's arc to be over before I propose him, entirely because of this) that should be described at least partially in the writeup. In particular this is only one of three explicit genocides in the Cosmere, one of those was stopped before it really got going, and the other was only described as part of the backstory.
