Elias Hackblade

"Crystal Stream! Blood of my hidden fairy clan! To crush the enemies before me, lend me your strength!"

- Elias Hackblade, volume 9 chapter 1

Elias Hackblade is a Blademancer-Ancient Elf Earthling and the "hero" of Elder Tale lore. After the Catastrophe, he was nearly sealed and killed by the Genius when Kanami arrived and saved him, prompting him to join her on her journey to Japan in order to find out what happened to the rest of the Ancients.

Elias is among the most famous Earthlings, being stated to be as renowned as the White Wing Princess, Ling Xiangfeng. He is also a member of the Red Branch Knights, one of the Thirteen Global Chivalric Orders.

Appearance
Elias is described as having the appearance of a hero, having chestnut-brown hair and eyes, donning a "snow-white armored coat" that had indigo accent lines. The anime changes his hair color to blonde.

Personality
Elias seems to be a rather jovial person, not batting an eyelash at Kanami's dynamic personality and spontaneity. However, he draws the line at being called "Eri-Eri," a nickname she insists on calling him because it's "cuter."

Before the Catastrophe
Elias was known as the "Hero of Elder Tale," and was featured on the box art for the game. In Elder Tale lore, he was protected by a deity known as the Sword Prince, and raised by fairies, from whom he learned his techniques. He was born from a fairy and a Human; as a result, he is a Shunned Child, something that has given him a deep sorrow. Because of the Fairy Eyes curse placed on his Mana Circuits, he cannot directly kill a monster, only lower them to a quarter of their HP.

In actuality, Elias is a man who doesn't want to kill, whether he's fighting monsters or Adventurers or People of the Earth or other Ancients, and his inability to lower targets to a quarter of their HP is a crystallization of this pledge.

Elias' history has been filled with women, earning him the ire of the TRPG development team.

The Sword Prince

The Sword Prince is known worldwide as the originator of the Fairy Arts and for being the guardian deity of the famous hero Elias Hackblade. The Sword Prince does his best to pull the strings of the young hero, embracing the impression that he is a bossy god by asking players, “Adventurers, save Elias with your strength!” The prince will occasionally request various items from adventurers as well.

The Sword Prince is either a pure-blooded Alv or an elf who is said to have silvery hair and whose gaze contains all the colors of a rainbow. However, there is a possibility that this is not the Sword Prince’s true form, since the god only appears when he can be silhouetted in the dim light. The only thing people are completely certain of is that the prince wields a two-handed great sword.

The Catastrophe
Because the fortune teller Smirthi Marra's darśana told the Ancients that "a great destruction was approaching Theldesia," the knight orders banded together to take on the Genius who were being sealed in the Fortress of Destruction. Because the seal was coming undone, they planned to rush the enemy when the seal broke and catch them off-guard. However, the Ancients themselves were ambushed when the seal somehow broke eight hours early, and the Genius utilized their "words of death" to drive the Ancients into insanity and then death.

Elias ordered the forced activation of the Transport Circle to the inside of the Fortress, even though doing so would drain all the power from the City Transport Gates (which is also why the Adventurers found them inactive after the Catastrophe). Although Elias stayed behind to buy time for the main attack force, he ended up listening to the words of death and was only barely saved by Kanami.

Go East! arc
Elias and Coppelia appear when Kanami decides that Leonardo should join them on their journey to Japan. He greets Leonardo cordially, offering him a handshake after Leonardo shows signs of recognition of him. A member of the Red Branch Knights, one of the Thirteen Global Chivalric Orders, Elias is a Blademancer specializing in Fairy Arts and a descendant of royalty.

Kanami calls him "Eri-Eri," only for him to tell her not to call him that. Leonardo is shocked by how familiar the two are with each other, as well as how Elias had left the server he was usually on. When Leonardo is distracted by Coppelia and getting healed, Kanami and Elias leave to go fight monsters. They end up engaging the genius Papus, who Elias recognizes as a Genius, and who almost kills Elias again with his "Words of Death" until Kanami intervenes.

Krusty, Tycoon Lord arc
Six months later, the group has made little progress in their journey, largely due to Kanami's wild tendencies. The events of the Catastrophe still weigh heavily on Elias, and he rejects all of Leonardo's attempts to pry out Elias' thoughts. Elias is separated from the others while traversing a mountain, and encounters Youren, a mysterious woman who claims to be another surviving Ancient. Despite being aware of evil Ancients, Elias readily believes her due to his loneliness. He first spars with Krusty in the mountains about the Sirius Grotto, but Krusty escapes by destroying the ground underneath himself and falling into the dungeon.

After this, Elias ends up being brainwashed and cursed by the disguised Genius, and fights against his former allies, Leonardo isolates him from the rest of the party and challenges him to a duel. He comes back to his senses after Krusty slays Papus, having reduced Leonardo to 1% of his HP and thus overcome his "curse." Leonardo then explains the Ancient hero's own backstory to him: that this mechanic was never actually a curse, but a crystallization of his pledge to never kill, and that he shouldn't hate himself by calling this a "curse".

Trivia

 * Elias shares a birthday (July 7) with Akatsuki.
 * According to Elissa, the development team was beside itself in jealousy over how many women cared for him in his backstory.