Orsted

Orsted is the current bearer of the title "Dragon God" — the third and nominally apex of the Seven Great World Powers. He carries the Hatred Curse, which forces any living thing that looks on him to feel instinctive, unaccountable fear or revulsion — infants cry at his approach. The curse is a side effect of the countless time loops he has lived and died through in attempts to kill Hitogami.

A tall man in black dragon-scale armour; silver hair, amber eyes. His voice is level and remote: centuries of repetition have left him without small talk, and he speaks to people with the same brevity he uses on the battlefield. He is profoundly just, keeps his word absolutely, and remembers every promise he has made — sometimes for several loops in succession.

In combat Orsted has no living equal: he commands the dragon's aura, can halt a Sword God's strike with one hand, and breaks armies single-handed. His true weapon, though, is knowledge — having lived hundreds of loops, he remembers where, when and by whom events will unfold, and uses that as strategic depth.

Hitogami manipulates each loop's course to kill Orsted before he can strike the fatal blow. After a loop in which Hitogami used Geese to destroy everything Orsted might have come to love, the Dragon God formed his final alliance with Rudeus Greyrat — the first human in any loop to befriend Orsted rather than hate him. That was the war's turning point.

By the end of the story Orsted is not only Rudeus's liege but his friend, as far as Orsted is capable of friendship. After Hitogami's defeat he remains the only being to remember every loop; in his memory Rudeus is the only one who lived all his years beside him and died of natural causes.