Taelien Salaris

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Taelien Salaris
Aliases	Keras Selyrian
Titles	The Taelien, Paladin of Aendaryn, Wielder of Dawnbringer, Amuletless Alliterator, Sorrowful Slayer of Sacred Stones, Supporter of Sapient Spirits, Cadet, Deity’s Demise, Sword of Shattered Stars, Great One (by Tavare)
Items	Ulandir's Ghost Lantern, Sculptor, Mask of Kishor, Ring of Deflection, Dawnbringer, Dominion Breaker, Pale King's Regalia
Occupation	Paladin of Tae'os
Species	Unknown
Continent	Mythralis Kaldwyn
World	Venaya
Featured In	War of Broken Mirrors, Weapons and Wielders, Arcane Ascension
Dominion Sorcery:	Metal Flame Stone Light Spirit Stability
Other Powers	Bond with Dawnbringer, Connection to Dominion Breaker, Enchantment Copying, Annihilation Aura

Taelien Salaris, also known as Keras Selyrian, is one of the main characters of the entire franchise. He is a hero with a dangerous and powerful artifact, known as the Dominion Breaker, who gets caught up in the machinations of powers beyond his understanding. He is one of the protagonists of the War of Broken Mirrors books, as well as the narrator and main character of the Weapons and Wielders series and an important character in the Arcane Ascension series.

Physical Description

A tall man with an athletic build and blue eyes that have hint of grey (maybe silver) in them, Taelien has long black hair that he lets flow loose. He's light skinned and prefers to go clean-shaven (though this might be a result of his abilities). Taelien prefers wearing long coats, and keeps several blades on his person at all times. When Keras draws on his annihilating powers then his irises turn silver and the color begins to bleed into his sclera.

Keras sheds hair less frequently than a human and his hair doesn't grow as quickly as a human's. Keras does not age in the same way a human would.

Personality

Taelien has a very mild mannered personality. He is fiercely loyal to his friends and willing to protect them at all costs.

He has a love for battle, and gets a wild grin every time he's about to jump into one, especially when the opponent is much stronger than him. However he is very much against taking lives needlessly.

History

Early Life

Taelien is thought to have been born (or possibly created) by Karasalia and Aendaryn, gods of the Mythralis continent, as a sort of spirit and wielder of the Sae’kes Taelien. He was raised by Rethri, who took him in after Erik Tarren asked them to keep Taelien safe for him.

Sufficiently Advanced Magic

Before the events of Suffifciently Advanced Magic, Keras is accused of heresy in the nation of Dalenos for his public assertion that the Goddess and her Visages are lying to the people of Kaldwyn about the extent of the Tyrant in Gold's power over the outside world. Fleeing from there, he attempts to get an audience with the Visage Tenjin in Valia, but finds Tenjin absent, with only Laura Lyran, Elora Theas and a few others present in the Council of Lords. He ends up fighting them, refusing to be handed over to a Dalian delegation and tried for heresy.

He attempts to climb the Serpent Spire, where he ends up in a prison that later, Corin Cadence finds him in during his Judgment. Fleeing from the prison together with Corin, Vera Corrington and Echion, they encounter the Visage Katashi who fights Keras.

Relations

Friends and Associates

Lydia Hastings

Lydia Hastings is Taelien's friend and commanding paladin officer. Keras is friends with Lydia despite knowing she was partially using him.

Jonan Kestrian

Taelien has spent time with Jonan and finds him irritating but does miss him.

Velas Jaldin

Velas is one of Keras' friends even with the injury she inflicted on him.

Landen

Landen is one of Keras' friends. Keras enjoys the friendly banter they have. Landen is one of his only friends that doesn't manipulate him in some way and Keras see's Your Friend as Landen in Dawnbringer's test.

Asphodel

Asphodel was a paladin candidate with Taelien and they became friends. However, Taelien finds her future sight unsettling and her vague advice irritating.

Wrynn Jaden

Wrynn is one of Keras' friends. She gifted him a shadeweave tunic and they have a close relationship with Keras being relieved when he finally managed to summon Wrynn.

Reika

Reika became friends with Keras after he bested and spared her after beating her in Dawnbringer's test. They travelled and competed in the Tournament of the Sacred Sword together.

Dawnbringer

Dawnbringer, Dawn, is the sentient Sacred Sword of light. She was bonded to Keras and joked with him frequently. She felt betrayed after discovering that Keras may be a living spirit of the Sae'kes but reconciled with him.

Corin Cadence

Corin is being trained by Keras and Keras was tasked with acting as his bodyguard by Katashi. Keras was willing to have memory crystals made of his fights to give to Corin.

Sera Cadence

Sera has a more unknown relationship with Keras. He gave her an, as of yet, unrevealed gift. They play Crowns together and when doing so Sera seems desperate to win. They have worked together on something with Keras claiming it to be too dangerous at Sera's level.

Patrick Wayland

Patrick views Keras as a legendary hero, the wielder of Dawnbringer and Diamantine. Keras made a copy of Dawnbringer, Bright Reflection, for Patrick and gave it the abilities he used in the Tournament.

Marissa Callahan

Marissa was also trained by Keras with Corin. Keras gave Mara emerald level enhancement elixirs to make her stronger.

Species Traits

Keras has a greater pain tolerance than humans due to his species. He has withstood and "walk[ed] off", stab, bite, acid and fire wounds that would easily incapacitate a human many times over.

Keras not being human is mostly an advantage in combat ability and his physiology means he can train in ways that would kill a human.

Keras's non-human nature has been noted by many elementals, including Tavare and War.

Magic

Taelien is unusual in terms of magical abilities, as he grows faster than other sorcerers and can gain additional powers from the items that he absorbs. This makes him hard to scale with other characters, as he does not work on the same standard as them.

Taelien may not just be a simple dominion sorcerer as the author has stated it was a good question to ask if he had any completed Dianis Points as of Forging Divinity and Lydia's diagnostics of his essence structure in Stealing Sorcery is the most revealed on the subject. Having completed Dianis Points would make him more like an essence sorcerer as well as a dominion sorcerer.

The essence source she had assumed was a second dominion bond was even more perplexing. When visualized, it did not look like veins of light at all – rather, it looked like his body contained several tiny stars, each of which emanated essence that permeated everything nearby. The auras from the stars saturated his entire body, growing brighter every time she observed them. The brightest stars were within his hands, and these were what she observed as Taelien began to draw the Sae’kes.

Dominion Sorcery

Dominion	Function
Flame	One of the three Dominions that Taelien has access to at the start of War of Broken Mirrors. He is skilled at Calling Fire, often evoking balls of flame for light, or throwing them at his opponents.
Stone	Stone is another one of Taelien's most utilized Dominions. He uses it to Call Stone essence into his body to reinforce his strength or shape stone essence in the terrain around him.
Metal	Metal is the Dominion that Taelien is most famous for using. His only use of Metal Calling has been for his Body of Iron spell. Otherwise, Taelien is mostly seen using it for shaping the metal in his weapons into a more useful shape, such as a link of chains to latch onto something.

Spirit Bonds

Dominion Breaker: The Dominion Breaker is the first of Taelien's many swords, as well as his strongest. He is bonded to it through yet unknown means, which provides him with an unusual and rare ability that lets him "annihilate" anything. This Annihilation essence is described as "cutting" things and can let him absorb abilities from magical items.

Essence	Function
Annihilation	Annihilation is Taelien's first and most dangerous power. It allows him to cut through anything regardless of strength, and absorb the essence from whatever he destroys. However, the more Taelien acclimates to Annihilation essence, the more he loses his personality. He becomes more cold, calculating and willing to murder, which is why he prefers it as a last resort.

Dawnbringer: The first of the Six Sacred Swords that Taelien ever bonded with, Dawnbringer provides him with access to three different essence types: light, enhancement and spirit. This bond also increases Keras' speed, physical abilities, mental processing speed and gives him a limited magic resistance.

Essence	Function
Light	Taelien gained access to the Dominion of Light from his bond with the Sacred Sword, Dawnbringer. It allows him to purge his body of toxins, enhance his abilities or shoot beams of light. He has not been shown to utilize Light shaping in any form.
Spirit	Spirit is another Dominion granted to him by Dawnbringer. Though he uses it much less than he would Stability or Light. His strongest spell utilizing Spirit essence is Body of Dawn, aside from which he hasn't been shown using it.
Stability	Stability is the last Dominion that Taelien is given access to through his bond with Dawnbringer. Stability strengthens his body, can be added to his spells to enhance them and is a component of his Body of Dawn spell.

Diamantine: The second of the Six Sacred Swords that Taelien bonded with. So far, we have not seen him show many abilities related to the essences granted by it.

Copied Powers

Keras has the strange power to learn from and pick up the abilities of items he uses.

Item	Function
Ulandir’s Ghost Lantern	Ulandir’s Ghost Lantern is a dominion bonded item that Keras had on Mythralis. The lantern revealed spirits when it was lit and Keras picked up the ability to see them, giving him what Wrynn called "a hint of spiritual awareness."
Sculptor	Sculptor is a dagger that can be used to shape stone. Whilst having the dagger in his possession, Keras' stone shaping skill increased greatly.
Mask of Kishor	The Mask of Kishor is a mask of a long dead god that covers the top half of the face. It is an artifact from the world Rendalir. The mask blocks magical detection, precognition and helps prevent people recognizing the wearer. Keras can now call upon the mask's power without needing it physically.
Ring of Spell Deflection	The Ring of Spell Deflection was a magic ring that used light mana to deflect spells. Using this ring helped Keras develop light magic, although his bond with Dawnbringer helped more.

Aura

Keras has developed an aura from the essence of the Sae'kes. The aura is silvery when viewed under magical effects. His aura glows more when he is actively using it. His aura cuts everything around him apart slowly. It destroys his clothes, enchanted items he has, the ground he walks on, the air nearby and it wears away at the shrouds that attuned have.

Sakki

Keras has a form of sakki, killing intent, which is so strong that other people can feel it. It is from his annihilation essence and it can be felt when Keras is angry. Corin describes it as feeling like "the air was alive with blades, that a drawn sword was ready to obliterate everything in a single unstoppable strike" and "a thousand swords were pressed against every weak spot on my body."

Spells

Keras casts his spells silently with mental commands relating to the effect he wants. He can also cast spells through his swords to extend his reach.

Dominion of Flame

As a dominion sorcerer, Taelien must expend some of his own flame essence, which helps regulate his body heat, to draw on more power from the Dominion of Flame, which makes him colder. His own flame essence will restore over time and in a slightly greater amount than before.

Disperse

With the mental command "disperse", Keras can cause fire to break down.

Ignite

With the mental command "ignite" Keras can create flickers of flame or a sphere of flame.

Flame Punching

Keras can call fire from the Dominion of Flame around his hands.

Burst

Keras can create a blast of flame with the mental command "blast".

Aura Ignition

Keras can reach out to the aura of the Sae'kes and use the mental command "burn" which caused white flames to ignite from the sword. This caused the Sae'kes' runes to glow white instead of the usual blue when he powers them directly. Keras did not feel the warmth of the flames.

Flame Deflection

Keras can try to deflect flames with his flaming shaping.

Fade

With the mental command "fade" Keras can cause flames to fade away.

Fireball

Keras can throw fireballs.

Heat

With the mental command "heat" Keras can cause a warm red glow to envelop his hands, producing light and heat. He can use this to burn what he touches and even burn his own wounds shut, although this is extremely painful. This is a relatively simple spell.

Flame Arc

Flame Arc is one of the simplest flame calling spells that Keras knows. It conjures a fan shaped wave of flame in front of him that burns everything within a few feet.

Aura of Fire

Keras can fill his entire aura with flames. He calls this Aura of Fire.

Shift

With the mental command "shift", Keras can command flames to move aside.

Body of Fire

Body of Fire is a technique that floods Keras' body with flame essence. Keras used this to remove the cold created by Xiaofan.

Heat Ripping

Keras can rip heat from materials.

Halting

Keras can try and halt the movement of flame with the mental command "halt".

Dominion of Stone

As a dominion sorcerer, Taelien must expend some of his own stone essence, which makes his physical strength and muscles work, to draw on more power from the Dominion of Stone, which makes him physically weaker. His own stone essence will restore over time and in a slightly greater amount than before.

Body of Stone

Body of Stone is one of Keras' most used techniques. It is a dominion calling spell which pulls stone essence from the Dominion of Stone into his body, making him temporarily stronger and tougher but it decreases his speed. Body of Stone can resist petrification effects and can use petrification spells as fuel to make Keras even stronger.

Petrification Resistance

Keras can use his stone sorcery to resist stone-based petrification spells.

Game Pieces

Keras can shape stone into game pieces.

Cover

Keras can shape stone to cause it to cover gaps.

Wall

With a stomp and the mental command "wall", Keras can shape stone into forming a wall.

Blades

With a stomp and the mental command "blades" or "spikes", Keras can shape stone into forming blades from the ground under his opponents.

Armor

With the mental command "armor", Keras can form a crude armor of stone. He does not use this on himself.

Handholds

Keras can shape stone into handholds.

Capturing

Keras can reshape stone to grab his enemies and trap them in place.

Opening

Keras can shape stone to make an opening in it with the mental command "open".

Collapse

With the mental command "collapse", Keras can cause stone to collapse.

Solidify

Keras can solidify stone.

Pillar

Keras can create stone pillars with his stone essence.

Halt

Keras can half stone from moving with the mental command "stop".

Dominion of Metal

As a dominion sorcerer, Taelien must expend some of his own metal essence, which makes his physical strength and muscles work, to draw on more power from the Dominion of Metal, which makes him physically weaker. His own metal essence will restore over time and in a slightly greater amount than before.

Body of Iron

Body of Iron is a similar spell to Body of Stone, but relying on metal essence instead of stone. This technique is stronger than Body of Stone, making him even stronger and tougher, but puts a greater strain on his body. Keras improved this technique to be able to direct where the essence goes in his body to lower the cost, but this means only the directed part of his body is reinforced.

Breaking

Taelien can break metal apart with the mental command "degrade" which causes the weakness in metal to expand. He can also use the mental command "shatter".

Flatten

With the mental command "flatten", Keras can cause metal to flatten down.

Merge

With the mental command "merge", Keras can cause pieces of metal to merge together.

Sharpen

With the mental command "sharpen", Keras can cause a piece of metal to become sharp.

Disguise Sword

Keras can change the Sae'kes to make it look like a regular sword with the mental command "ordinary". He can easily reverse this process with the mental command "revert".

Open

Keras can make an opening in metal with the mental command "open".

Seal

Keras can seal things in place with metal, which he often does to the Sae'kes and the scabbard to prevent it being drawn. The mental command "release" undoes the change.

Magnetism

Keras can apply magnetism to metal.

Lightning Attraction

Keras can shape metal to act as a lightning rod.

Separate

With the mental command "separate" Keras can separate metal apart.

Magnetic Repulse

With the mental command "magnetic repulse" Keras can push metal away.

Condense

Keras can condense metal with the mental command "condense". This is undone with the mental command "return".

Property Adjustment

Keras can alter metal to give it properties that other metals have.

Chain

Keras can change metal into lengths of chain. He has done this with the Sae'kes' blade and reverses it later.

Tighten

Keras can cause metal to tighten with the mental command "tighten".

Dominion of Light

Keras gained access to light essence through his contract with Dawnbringer. He began to develop light essence in his own body, in usable amounts, after using Dawnbringer for long enough. Drawing heavily on light essence has subtler costs: slowing movements, reducing mental clarity and decreasing resistance to poison, disease, and hostile magic.

Body of Dawn

Body of Dawn is one of Keras' strongest techniques. It is a combination of light, spirit and stability essence. This technique is very exhausting. The technique increases strength, speed, and magic resistance immensely while active but all of those are decreased until his body had a chance to recover. When using this technique, Keras seems to be a blur as he moves so fast.

Resplendent Raiment

Resplendent Raiment is a technique that Keras developed. It increases his speed and can help remove supressing techniques. This is not as fast as Body of Dawn.

Poison Neutralisation

Keras can use light to neutralise poison in his body.

Compulsion Neutralisation

Keras can use light essence to try and destroy compulsion effects placed on him.

Light Blade

Keras can launch cutting blasts of light. He can also split the light into three separate blades.

Aura

Keras can wrap his weapons in an aura of light.

Golden Dawn

Keras can use Dawnbringer's Golden Dawn technique with his own light essence. This creates a flare of bright light.

Dominion of Spirit

Keras gained access to spirit essence through his contract with Dawnbringer. He began to develop spirit essence in his own body, in usable amounts, after using Dawnbringer for long enough.

Body of Dawn

Body of Dawn is one of Keras' strongest techniques. It is a combination of light, spirit and stability essence. This technique is very exhausting. The technique increases strength, speed, and magic resistance immensely while active but all of those are decreased until his body had a chance to recover. When using this technique, Keras seems to be a blur as he moves so fast.

Spirit Sight

Keras could flare spirit essence into his eyes to help see hidden people.

Dominion of Stability

Keras gained access to stability (often known as enhancement) essence through his contract with Dawnbringer. He began to develop enhancement essence in his own body, in usable amounts, after using Dawnbringer for long enough.

Body of Dawn

Body of Dawn is one of Keras' strongest techniques. It is a combination of light, spirit and stability essence. This technique is very exhausting. The technique increases strength, speed, and magic resistance immensely while active but all of those are decreased until his body had a chance to recover. When using this technique, Keras seems to be a blur as he moves so fast.

Enhancement Burst

Keras can launch bursts of enhancement essence from his hands which blasts things that are hit.

Physical Empowerment

Keras can send enhancement mana through his body to generally empower himself.

Annihilation Essence

Keras gained his strange annihilating essence from the use of the Sae'kes. The essence from the sword bled into his body and he began to utilise the essence and the essence began to form an aura around Keras that wears away at things nearby. This power can not be taken by a Vae'kes.

Body of Annihilation

Keras used his Body of Annihilation spell by pulling on power from the Sae'kes instead of holding it at bay. Whilst using this spell he effortlessly cut through the entirety of multiple layers of self. He could cut thousands of shades at once. Using this spell twisted his personality, he cut off his other spells believing all he needed was destruction. He began to view people as targets and prey whilst using the spell. He believed that if he were hit by "unfathomably dangerous" power he would only grow stronger. Keras even wanted to destroy Dawn because she stopped him murdering other people and considered her interference to mean she was a threat.

Against Keras using Body of Annihilation, anyone weaker than World Maker level is in "a lot of trouble".

Magic Items

Sae’kes Taelien

The Sae'kes Taelien is the most powerful weapon at Taelien's disposal. It is a powerful dominion marked sword with seven runes and a jewelled pommel. The sword has an aura that annihilates anything it touches. Taelien has to actively suppress the aura when he uses the blade to prevent it cutting through his allies by powering the runes on the blade. The name of the blade the 'Sae’kes Taelien' is from the Liadran language and roughly translates to 'Sword that gives destruction to all things'. The sword is also known as the Dominion Breaker. Every time that Keras uses the Sae'kes it leaks some annihilation essence into his body - giving Keras an aura that annihilates everything around him and a supply of annihilation essence that he can use. The blade's aura does not hurt Keras despite cutting everything else. The gemstone pommel is connected to the Dominion of Travel and the gem in the hilt is connected to the Dominion of Insight. Training to power the runes on the sword has helped strengthen the dominion connections in Keras' body. There are a few abilities that the Sae'kes can perform: 'Spell Breaker', 'Mana Breaker/Essence Breaker' and 'Dominion Breaker'. Keras has demonstrated the ability to use the Spell Breaker technique and was stopped just before using Essence Breaker. Every time Keras uses the Sae'kes he desires to use it more.

Spell Breaker

Spell Breaker is a power from the Sae'kes. It is the ability to detonate spells, artifacts and enchantments. Detonating even weak spells causes destruction with varying types of damage depending on the mana type of the destroyed spell when mixed with the annihilation power of the Sae'kes. If Keras destroys enchanted items with his Spell Breaker technique a little essence from the item goes to Keras empowering him.

Essence Breaker

Essence Breaker also known as Mana Breaker is another technique from the Sae'kes. It causes mana within the body of anyone cut with the Sae'kes when the technique is active to explode, creating a massive blast, which could then potentially cause a chain reaction of mana resulting in an infinitely spreading explosion.

Dominion Breaker

Dominion Breaker is a technique named after one of the names for the blade. This technique is sealed away with part of the incantation lost forever.

Scabbard for the Sae'kes

Keras has a scabbard which is one of the few things that can restrain the Sae'kes. It uses immensely powerful protection sorcery. The more damaged the scabbard becomes the more Keras is willing to draw on the Sae'kes.

Notes

References: