Red Rising

by Pierce Brown

Darrow is a Red, the lowest caste in a color-coded society spanning the solar system. When he discovers the surface of Mars has been terraformed while his people slave underground, he is transformed into a Gold and infiltrated into their elite military academy. To start a revolution, he must first become the enemy.

56 characters, locations, and items in this world codex.

Characters

• Darrow au Andromedus — A Red Helldiver carved into a Gold demigod — the Reaper who broke the chains of the Society, waged impossible wars, and became Mars's bloodiest legend
• Virginia au Augustus — Brilliant Gold strategist who became Sovereign of the Republic — a woman who rules with intellect where others rule with razors, carrying the impossib
• Sevro au Barca — Tiny, feral, profane Howler leader — half Red, half Gold, all violence and loyalty. Darrow's best friend, Ares's son, and the most dangerous small per
• Cassius au Bellona — The Morning Knight — a golden god among Golds, peerless duelist, tragic romantic. Darrow's rival, friend, betrayer, and ultimately the man who chose h
• Adrius au Augustus — The Jackal — psychopath prodigy, Virginia's twin, a mind like a scalpel wielded by a soul that enjoys the cutting. He would rather rule ashes than ser
• Eo of Lykos — Darrow's first wife — a Red girl who sang a forbidden song, was hanged for it, and in dying lit a fire that burned down the world. She is the wound th
• Nero au Augustus — ArchGovernor of Mars, patriarch of House Augustus — a cold strategist who ruled through calculated cruelty, loved his daughter more than his empire, a
• Octavia au Lune — Sovereign of the Society for over seventy years — an iron grandmother who ruled humanity's empire from Luna with smiles, poison, and Olympic Knights.
• Aja au Grimmus — Octavia's Fury — the greatest warrior in the Society, an Olympic Knight who killed like other people breathed. The razor was an extension of her will,
• Fitchner au Barca — Ares — the hidden architect of the Rising, a Gold who loved a Red woman and spent his life burning down the system that murdered her. Sevro's father,
• Lorn au Arcos — The Rage Knight — greatest razormaster of his generation, a living legend who retired from killing only to be dragged back into a war he always knew w
• Ragnar Volarus — The Obsidian Stained — eight feet of freed slave warrior who learned that his gods were lies, and chose to fight for real ones. His death broke Darrow
• Dancer — Red rebel commander — the practical heart of the Sons of Ares, the man who carved Darrow into a weapon and then watched that weapon grow beyond anyone
• Harmony — Radical Red insurgent who became what the Society feared most — a terrorist who stopped distinguishing between Gold oppressors and Gold allies. The re
• Victra au Julii — Fierce, foul-mouthed Gold warrior who married Sevro and matched his chaos with her own — a woman betrayed by her own family who built a new one from H
• Kavax au Telemanus — A Gold mountain with a poet's heart — massive, booming, fiercely loyal patriarch of House Telemanus. Fights like a bear, laughs like thunder, loves li
• Roque au Fabii — Poet, admiral, betrayer — a sensitive Gold who loved beauty and hated the lie that Darrow was. His betrayal was not cruelty but heartbreak weaponized,
• Tactus au Valii-Rath — Wild, mercurial Gold — beautiful and broken, a hedonist who almost found redemption before the war swallowed him. Darrow believed he could be saved. T
• Daxo au Telemanus — Kavax's enormous son — a Republic senator who fights for democracy with words instead of razors, though he's perfectly capable of both.
• Regulus ag Sun — The richest man alive — a Silver magnate who secretly financed the entire Rising because tyranny is bad for business and freedom is the ultimate marke
• Romulus au Raa — Sovereign of the Rim Dominion — an honorable Gold who wants nothing to do with the Core's wars and will fight anyone who tries to drag his people into
• Orion xe Aquarii — Blue pilot genius — born to navigate stars, freed to wage war in them. The Rising's finest helmsman, whose brilliance behind a ship's controls borders
• Holiday ti Nakamura — Gray agent turned Republic loyalist — a soldier-spy whose quiet competence and fierce loyalty make her one of the Rising's most valuable operatives. S
• Trigg ti Nakamura — Holiday's brother — a Gray soldier with a good heart who died fighting for the Rising, proving that heroism comes in quiet colors.
• Lysander au Lune — Octavia's grandson, heir to the Lune dynasty — a golden prince raised in exile who believes with terrifying sincerity that Gold's return to power is h
• Ephraim ti Horn — Gray thief, addict, reluctant hero — a broken man dragged into caring about something again. He stole for money and then for a cause, and the cause ki
• Lyria of Lagalos — Red refugee, fierce survivor — a girl from the mines who discovered the Republic's promise of freedom rings hollow when you are still poor, still Red,
• Volga Fjorgan — Ragnar's daughter — an Obsidian giant with a gentle soul trapped in a world that demands violence from her blood. She wants peace and keeps finding wa
• Atlas au Raa — The Fear Knight — the Rim's master strategist and torturer, a man who weaponizes psychology with surgical precision. He does not break bodies; he brea
• Diomedes au Raa — The Storm Knight — Rim Gold's greatest warrior, an honorable blade in a dishonorable war. His code is older than the Society, and he follows it even w
• Apollonius au Valii-Rath — The Minotaur — a flamboyant psychopath genius who turns warfare into theater and murder into art. He is Gold excess given a razor and told to perform,
• Pax au Augustus — Darrow and Mustang's son — enormous for his age, carrying the weight of two bloodlines and a galaxy's expectations. A child of war learning what peace
• Electra au Barca — Sevro and Victra's daughter — a feral little princess raised by Howlers, as wild and fierce as both her parents combined.
• Antonia au Julii-Barca — Victra's treacherous half-sister — a venomous Gold who chose the Society's cruelty over family loyalty and paid the price for backing the wrong side.
• Matteo — Pink companion to Quicksilver — a gentle soul who proves that kindness is its own form of resistance in a system that engineered his Color for servitu
• Alexandar au Arcos — Lorn's grandson — a young Peerless Scarred carrying the Rage Knight's legacy, desperate to prove worthy of a name that casts a shadow longer than his
• Seraphina au Raa — Rim Gold warrior — Diomedes's sister, Romulus's daughter, fierce and proud and caught between her family's honor and the Rim's increasingly impossible

Locations

• Mars — The Red planet — breadbasket of the Society, cradle of the Rising. Beneath its terraformed surface, Reds mine helium-3 in darkness so that Golds can r
• Luna — Earth's moon and capital of the Society. Seat of the Sovereign, playground of the most powerful Gold families, and the political center of the solar s
• Earth — The diminished birthworld of humanity. Once the center of civilization, now a polluted backwater eclipsed by Luna and Mars in the Society's hierarchy.
• Mercury — Sun-scorched warfront where the Republic's forces became trapped in a grinding siege. The Ash Rain falls here — volcanic debris that chokes the sky an
• Io — Volcanic moon of Jupiter and seat of the Rim Dominion. Home of the austere, militant Golds who rejected Core decadence and built their own civilizatio
• Phobos — Mars's larger moon, converted into an orbital dock and transit hub. A critical chokepoint for anyone trying to control access to Mars.
• Lykos — Darrow's home — a Red mining colony deep beneath the surface of Mars. Where Eo sang, where she was hanged, and where a man decided to burn the world d
• Agea — Capital city of Mars and seat of House Augustus. A Gold jewel built atop the bones of Red labor, where power is wielded with elegance and cruelty in e
• Olympus Mons — The tallest volcano in the solar system, rising from the Martian surface. Strategic high ground and site of pivotal battles during the wars for Mars.
• The Institute — The brutal training ground where Gold youth are sorted into houses and forced to wage war on each other. Survivors earn the Peerless Scarred — and the
• The Citadel — The Sovereign's fortress-palace on Luna. Seat of absolute power in the Society, where Octavia au Lune ruled the solar system with an iron fist sheathe
• Sun Industries — Quicksilver's vast commercial empire headquartered on Luna. The Silver magnate's network of shipyards, factories, and trading houses that secretly fun
• The Rim — The outer planets confederation — Jupiter, Saturn, and their moons. Home to austere Rim Golds who rejected Core decadence and built a martial society
• Heliopolis — Mercury's capital city and the primary theater of the devastating urban warfare that consumed Darrow's forces for years during the Republic era.
• The Deep Mines — The helium-3 mining tunnels beneath Mars where Red clans live and die in darkness, believing they are terraforming a dead world. The foundation of the

Items

• Razor — The iconic Gold weapon — a ring of metal that unfurls into a meter-long whip-blade at the flick of a wrist. The weapon that defines Gold martial cultu
• The Morning Star — Darrow's captured dreadnought — a Society warship seized during the Rising and turned into the flagship of the revolution. Named for the light that he
• StarShell — Powered space armor used for zero-gravity and atmospheric combat. Turns a warrior into a one-person fighter craft — armed, shielded, and terrifyingly
• Sigils — Color-identifying marks implanted at birth that brand every person in the Society with their caste. The visible chain of the Color hierarchy — carried

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