Gaudius

 is one of the Somnovem of the mutated Cognouza Ward of the city of Aeor. As an NPC, is played by Matthew Mercer.

Appearance
Gaudius's appearance, age, race, or gender prior to the flight of Cognouza into the Astral Plane and its subsequent transformation are unknown.

When Gaudius was encountered by the Mighty Nein in the warped and mutated flying city, they took the form of a glowing red orb pushing up through the flesh of the floors and walls of the city that became an eye buoyed up from the ground like a twisted arm, with a strange bead of orange-yellow pupil-like light in the center.

Personality
While it is unknown what the pre-Calamity Gaudius's personality was, when the party encountered them in Cognouza they seemed soft-spoken and gentle but casually suggested that the party kill those others of the Somnovem with whom Gaudius disagreed. While they said that true purpose was protecting those that brought the Mighty Nein joy and meaning, their own purpose seemed to be "to bond everything in love and to become one [...]. Absolute, eternal love without boundaries." Something about the voice and the light of the glowing red eye was oddly comforting in the way it spoke.

Biography
Gaudius was one of the nine leaders, the Somnovem, of the Aeorian neighborhood called Cognouza. Those leaders led the ward to escape the destruction of Aeor by the gods and transport themselves into the Astral Sea, where they encountered a psychic storm that racked every mind and spirit and shattered them until they became one with their own city. Thousands of people and the Somnovem that guided them were broken, and over time slowly reformed, powerful, the instinct of their dreams driving them, in a place where they could will their dreams to be, were their will not so fragmented.

Gaudius was the third of the Somnovem that the party encountered. They spoke to the party in the form of a glowing red orb, saying that "the others" were all searching for the Nonagon. Gaudius expressed support of the love and sense of family the party felt toward each other, saying that Gaudius's goal was to bind everyone in absolute eternal love without boundaries, erasing "the horrid separation that plagues all life in the cosmos, breeding strife through loneliness and misunderstanding." Their fellow Somnovem Fastidan and Culpasi, however, rejected the embrace, through what Gaudius termed disgust, arrogance, and deeply misplaced shame.

Gaudius urged the party to find the essences of Fastidan and Culpasi at the Aether Crux and "grant them their separation from reality," so that the rest of the Somnovem could join together without doubt.

During the battles with Lucien as the Neo-Somnovem and the Cognouza incarnate, attack by Gaudius's eye flickered a warm, welcoming sensation, filled with longing and love, which caused the target to become charmed for one minute. It could be resisted with a successful Wisdom saving throw. Even on a success, however, it sometimes caused a new eye to appear on the target's body.

Relationships

 * The Somnovem

Abilities

 * Telepathy

Quotations

 * Ira: (snarling) Gaudius, do not trust them. They push forward without call for truth in the evils of existence. They wash us all towards oblivion with arms open and naive.
 * Gaudius: You arrive by sheer force of love and family, protecting those that bring you joy and meaning. That is true purpose. Through these bonds eternal, everything, everything has meaning. We seek to bond everything in love and to become one as we all are. Absolute, eternal love, without boundaries.
 * Gaudius: [Fastidan and Culpasi] are driven from unity through disgust, arrogance, and deeply misplaced shame. They would divide and maintain the horrid separation that plagues all life in the cosmos, breeding strife through loneliness and misunderstanding. If you could show love for each other, and for us, could you find where they're harbored within the Aether Crux, and maybe grant them their separation from reality as they so seek, so that the rest of us might join without doubt? Please.

Trivia

 * The name "Gaudius" may be derived from the Latin word for joy, gaudium, or rejoicing, gaudeo.