Taelien Salaris

This article is a stub. You can help by expanding it.

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
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.

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.

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.

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.

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.
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.

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: