Rundelhaus Code

""Okay! Leave it to me, I'll handle the transaction.""

- Rundelhaus, Volume 8

Rundelhaus Code (also spelled "Rundel Haus Code" and "Rundelhous Cord", among other translations), also known as Rudy, is one of the People of the Earth in the world of Theldesia. He is a Human Sorcerer-Adventurer and currently a member of Log Horizon.

Originally posing as an ordinary, if eccentric, Adventurer, he joins the Summer Training Camp and is assigned into Touya's Party. During the defense of Choushi Town, he reveals himself as a Person of the Earth when he sacrifices his life to defeat a Dire Wolf. However, thanks to Shiroe's timely intervention, he is turned into a pseudo-Adventurer and joins the guild as a liasion between the Adventurers and the People of the Earth.

He has also participated in the Shibuya Raid Team and Akiba Guild Hall Raid Party.

Appearance
Rundelhaus is a young, noble-looking boy with blond hair and blue eyes. He has been described as attractive by a few characters, although his popularity is decreased by his somewhat eccentric personality.

Personality
At the start of the story, Rundelhaus comes across as a brash and boastful person with a bit of a narcissistic streak. He has a habit of using English phrases when being especially flamboyant, making the rest of his party conclude he was a rich pampered kid in the old world. However, in spite of these off-putting traits, he is genuinely hardworking and thoughtful about his combat abilities.

The reason behind his boastful nature (like thinking that being level 23 is high) and the significance behind his participation at the summer training camp is revealed during the defense of Choushi Town. Rundelhaus is not an Adventurer, but a Person of the Earth—thus he naturally has much lower EXP gain, lower innate combat ability, and most importantly, cannot revive after death.

Having grown up in a corrupt noble family, Rundelhaus' frustration with them made him choose to emulate the freedom and righteousness he saw in Adventurers. To this end, he risked death several times during the party's attempts at Lagranda Dungeon; he even takes an arrow to his skull in their first battle (toned down to catching the arrow between his fingers in the anime). Despite repeated failures, near-death experiences, and the exhaustion he endures, he never falters and vows to train even harder until they can succeed.

His determination, resolve, and desire to protect the People of the Earth culminate in his self-sacrifice during the defense of Choushi. This event, however, is also what fulfills his dream when Shiroe saves his life using the information he recently gleaned from Li Gan regarding the Spirit Theory. Now both an Earthling and an Adventurer, his unique status proves invaluable for relations between the two groups later in the story.

Out of all of the Log Horizon members, while he loves them all, he seems to get along with Isuzu the best, with Touya a close second. However, he also is confused by Isuzu's treatment of him, wondering if her hitting him constantly is an Adventurer custom that he doesn't understand.

Before the Catastrophe
The third son of a corrupted military governing family of the Ninetails Dominion, Rundelhaus Code, nicknamed Rudy, was one of the Earthlings that inhabited the world of Elder Tale. As he grew up, he was captivated by the freedom and sense of justice of Adventurers who fought for his people. After the Catastrophe, this admiration subsequently led to him taking on the guise of an Adventurer. He put tremendous effort into this guise; as a Earthling, his EXP leveling rate was 1/4 that of an Adventurer, yet he was able to achieve a class level similar to beginning adventurers before his status change (most professional POTL soldiers only have a level in the low teens at best).

At some point, his hometown was destroyed.

Round Table Alliance arc
Rundelhaus makes several cameos, watching the starry sky and purchasing a Crescent Burger.

Summer Training Arc
Pretending to be a Sorcerer, Rudy joins a summer training camp in the Sand Leaf Peninsula hosted by the Round Table Alliance for the low-level adventurers of Akiba. He is grouped with twins Minori and Touya and Crescent Moon Alliance members Isuzu and Serara to challenge the Ragranda Forest dungeon.

Though initially having a difficult time working as a team, the five learn to work together after learning about each others' skills and abilities. Their teamwork allows the team to successfully clear their half of the dungeon, even defeating a powerful monster called Burning Dead.

As the days go by, Rudy grows close to the Bard Isuzu. While camping outside one night, Isuzu discovers Rudy's true identity as a Person of the Earth when she is unable to add him to her friend list. Isuzu promises to keep it a secret after he tells her of his strong desire to live as an adventurer.

Return of the Goblin King arc
As the team grows stronger by the day, the event Return of the Goblin King triggers. Goblins, as well as Sahuagins, invade the Sand Leaf Peninsula. The invasion endangers the town of Choushi and the adventurers training in the peninsula decide to guard it.

While the other members of the training camp defend Choshi town from the Sahuagins invading from the sea, Rudy and his party mates successfully eliminating several goblin parties all by themselves, proving to be excellent assets for the defense. However, fatigue and the number of the enemies overwhelm the group as they fight a party of goblins, hobgoblins and dire wolves. Faced with the possibility of them being wiped out and the town being overrun, Rudy sacrifices himself to defeat the enemy.

As Rudy dies, Serara and Minori try to resurrect him to no avail. Desperately, Minori calls her guild master Shiroe for help. Shiroe arrives minutes later and manages to save Rudy by having him sign a top-class contract that he created. In exchange for being a member of Log Horizon, the contract forcibly gives Rudy the Adventurer subclass, giving him all of their abilities, one of which is the ability to respawn at the Cathedral when he falls in battle which saved him from death.

Route 43 arc
Rudy joins to the rest of Touya's Party on their quest to acquire Dazaneg's Magic Bag. At Earthling villages, the Adventurers (sans Rudy) perform for them, and Isuzu starts gaining a fandom among them. She dismisses her music as just stuff she does in her spare time, but then Rudy reveals why the Earthlings loved it so much: they only know 42 tunes and are unable to create more. Because of that, they find her music amazing. This revelation makes Isuzu upset, because she feels like she’s cheating the Earthlings by playing music that wasn’t hers. However, Rudy reassures her that it’s okay because it makes people happy, and that’s what matters.

During the Wyvern invasion of the town of Saphir, Rudy resolves to protect its inhabitants, wanting to spare it from the fate of his own hometown. It is during this desperate defense that Isuzu realizes that during the defense of Choushi, Rudy meant to risk his life to defend his people, the People of the Earth, there. When the Odysseia Knights start drawing the wyverns and night shades into a populated part of the town and coldly tell a Person of the Earth to shut up and accept her fate, Rudy is hurt and outraged to the point of tears, as despite his newfound power as an Adventurer, there are still other People of the Earth he isn't able to save or protect, and there are Adventurers like the Odysseia Knights who don't see his people, the People of the Earth, as human.

In the middle of the battle Isuzu becomes more desperate. Throwing away her spear, she takes out her lute, to Rudy’s surprise. She sings a song that she created herself, the 43rd Song, which filled the air with rainbow-colored notes and turned the rubble into shields, protecting the Earthlings and the Adventurers.

After the battle, the kids decide to leave the day after. Rudy understands that some Earthlings would blame the Adventurers for what happened and for not protecting everyone, and didn’t want his friends to be hurt by those words. As they are leaving, Rudy and Isuzu hear some Earthling children singing. It’s Isuzu’s song, which has reached their hearts and has truly become the 43rd song. As she burst into tears, Rudy hands her his handkerchief. It’s her birthday song, a song that will spread throughout Yamato.

Noosphere arc
Rudy is noted to turn 20 years old during the events of this arc in the Light Novel. After the early revelation from Roe2's letter that the Adventurers may now have a path to return to their native world, Rudy prepares himself for their goodbye, as he knew that this was inevitable and that the Adventurers he had met had a world they missed and wanted to return to. Ultimately, however, this goodbye would not come during the events of this arc.

Rudy is a participant in the Shibuya Raid Team.

Collapse of the Round Table arc
Rudy continues his work as a counselor for the People of the Earth settling in Akiba, and by this time, the People of the Earth outnumber the Adventurers in the city several times over. He provides valuable insights to the rest of his guild and other Round Table members on the mentality of the People of the Earth in the wake of Touri naming Eins the Duke of Akiba and the Akiba General Election being called. According to him, People of the Earth who migrate from impoverished villages to Akiba value the city as a place where they can easily learn skills and make their dreams come true, but that since they are migrants, they view themselves as refugees vulnerable to expulsion at any time. He also notes that many People of the Earth in the city are rather traditional and conservative-minded, and disapprove of Raynesia's rejection of Touri's marriage proposal even if they may personally like her.

Nightingale's Song arc
During this arc, Isuzu is more aggressive in trying to get Minori to be forward to Shiroe with her feelings, and Rudy expresses disapproval of Isuzu's antics several times.

Rudy, Touya, Isuzu and Serara are the first Adventurers to find Lelia Mofur and Litka Mofur waylaid on a road near Akiba, and eventually they bring the two Ancient sisters home to the Log Horizon guild house. Eventually, when the Genius Eirenus arrives, it falls to Rudy and the other youngsters in Log Horizon and the Crescent Moon Alliance to defeat it in the Akiba Guild Hall Raid. This comes with difficulty, however, especially as Eirenus employs a memory attack which cripples Rudy and the other young Adventurers.

After the conclusion of the raid, Rudy is consoling a sorrowful Isuzu, who is wracked with guilt realizing the depth of Minori's feelings for Shiroe during their fight with the Genius. This time, he tells her to not intervene, likening Minori's feelings for Shiroe to a door that Minori alone can open and pass through, but to stay by her side as her friend.

Side Story: Birthday IV
Rudy is the focus of the side story, Birthday IV, which was predictably released on his birthday.

Log Horizon: New Adventure Land
Rudy is a recruitable character in the mobile game. He currently has four forms: his volume 8 outfit, a SR and LR version of his interim outfit, and his swimsuit.

Other Equipment
Magician Gauntlet: is a level 25 equipment that boosts the damage of magical attacks. Rundelhaus and his party mates won it at Ragranda Forest and the other members decided to give the item to Rundelhaus, the only mage of the group.

Trivia

 * In Contract, Rudy signed the contract as Rundellhous Kode. Tetsuya Kakihara, Rudy's Japanese voice actor, designed this spelling.
 * Between all the different media, Rudy's name has been spelled the following ways: Rundelhaus, Rundellhous, Rundelhaus, and Rundel Haus. His last name varies between Code, Kode, Cord, and Core.
 * In the Let's Go to Summer Camp! manga chapter illustrated by Hara Kazuhiro, it is revealed that Rudy's swimsuit was donated to Log Horizon (and more specifically, Shiroe) by The Roderick Firm. In order to avoid wearing it, among other reasons, Shiroe skipped attending the summer camp. Touya then took it with him just in case there was an attendee without a swimsuit.