Godwyn the Golden

Godwyn the Golden is a background character in Elden Ring. He was a demigod and the son of Queen Marika the Eternal and Godfrey the First Elden Lord, making him a member of the royal Golden Lineage. In the Night of the Black Knives, he was assassinated by Black Knife Assassins with the use of daggers imbued with the Rune of Death, stolen from Maliketh, the Black Blade. His death would precipitate the Shattering, a war between the demigods which would be responsible for much of the current state of the Lands Between.

Godwyn was a scion of the so-called "Golden Line", of which Godrick the Grafted was the final descendant. Early in his mother's divine reign, the Erdtree came under assault by the Ancient Dragons, who had ruled the world before Marika's ascent. The forces of the Erdtree managed to triumph against the ancient dragons, with Godwyn prevailing against the dreaded Fortissax, earning the mighty dragon's friendship in the process.

Seeking to be free from her fate as a pawn of the Greater Will, Godwyn's half-sister Lunar Princess Ranni stole a fragment of the rune of death, imbuing the weapons of Numen assassins with the rune. Ranni wished to shed her Empyrean body but preserve her spirit, which meant that someone else's spirit would need to die. Nevertheless, when the assassins fell upon the Royal Capital and murdered Godwyn, his soul was destroyed and left only his soulless body behind. He was the first demigod in history to die since the ascension of Marika to the throne of the Lands Between.

Godwyn's death would be the catalyst for the Shattering of the Elden Ring, plunging the kingdom into chaos without the guidance of the Greater Will. Due to Ranni's ritual, Godwyn's flesh was branded with half of the Cursemark of Death and he became the first of Those Who Live in Death. His body was laid to rest deep in the roots of the Erdtree, but it would eventually corrupt it, leading Deathroot to sprout across the Lands Between, causing others to also rise in undeath. These undead worshipped Godwyn as the Prince of Death, believing he would eventually return and lead them. An aspect of Godwyn's corpse appeared in the depths of Stormveil CastleDungeon and is responsible for the loss of Rogier's legs. Many figures, including his half-brother Miquella and his companion Fortissax, tried to cure him of his condition and allow him a proper death (see Golden Epitaph), but to no avail. Fortissax would also become corrupted because of his failure to defeat the Death within Godwyn (see Remembrance of the Lichdragon).

The deathbed companion Fia would become a leading figure among Those Who Live in Death, eventually making her way to Godwyn's corpse. Having received the other half of the cursemark from Ranni's discarded body with help of the Tarnished, Fia lay with Godwyn to grant him a second life as the Prince of Death. As a result of their union, Fia conceived a rune, which a Tarnished seeking to become Elden Lord might use to mend the Elden Ring, reimbuing the principle of death within the Golden Order.