Rod Reiss

"This is the duty of the Reiss family, the Royal Family."

- Rod describing to Historia the Reiss succession ceremony

Rod Reiss (ロッド・レイス) was a member of the true royal family within the Walls, operating from the inner lands of Wall Sina. He was the father of Historia Reiss.

Human form
Rod, like his daughter, is a rather short person. Though, unlike his daughter, he is a slightly overweight man, with a round face, short, jagged black hair and a thin black mustache. He is typically seen wearing the clothes of a wealthy man, featuring a white button-front shirt with a black pullover vest, loose black pants and black dress shoes. However, when conducting the Titan rituals, he wears a white shirt and pants with a long coat, as do the other Reiss males during family meetings.

Titan form
In this form, Rod is an abnormal Titan. Rod Reiss' appearance as a Titan retains practically nothing of his human form, except for still being male-like. He grows to the point of becoming the largest Titan ever known, said to be twice as large as the Colossal Titan, who is 60 meters in height. However, his body is quite disproportionate, having a large torso with a small head, and very thin limbs for his size, thus being unable to stand up and needing to walk on all fours. He is also notably skeletal, with most of his bones clearly visible and very few muscles. He lacks a face due to the friction with the ground as it destroys the front half of his head due to constant dragging as he walks, even exposing his brain. However, if he were to remain off the ground and not dragging his head, he would regenerate a full face in time. His ribs cover only the sides of his body, and the frontal area lacks skin and muscles also due to the dragging as he walks. This exposes his internal organs.

Like the Colossal Titan, his enormous size makes him move slowly and generate lots of heat, always being covered by clouds of steam. The heat he produces is so high that it's impossible to touch him without getting burned, and the trees near him burst into flames.

Personality
Rod often appears to have a calm, yet slightly worried demeanor. He speaks with great certainty and intelligence about the events of his daughter, Frieda Reiss, and his brother, Uri Reiss, when they obtained and lost the Coordinate power. Rod maintains a level head throughout most of his time with Historia, Eren Yeager, and Kenny Ackerman. He even gathers his composure after Kenny grabs him and begins shoving a knife down his throat. However, when Historia throws him, crushes the serum, and bashes his claims of godhood, he becomes erratic and panicked. After the syringe is shattered on the ground, he begins lightly crying and desperately licks it off the floor so that he may become a Titan himself.

History
When Rod was still a young boy, he met Kenny Ackerman when he tried to kill his brother and former king, Uri Reiss. Despite Rod telling Uri several times that they should kill him, especially if he was an Ackerman, Uri refused and apologized to Kenny. This created a bond between the two and Kenny became a servant of the Royal Family, especially to Rod.

Rod Reiss conceived Historia with Alma, one of his maids. When Historia was discovered, his mistress and daughter were exiled to a land that he leased to Historia's maternal grandparents.

On the day that Wall Maria fell to the Armored and Colossal Titan's attack, the entire Reiss family went to a chapel to pray in a secret underground area. However, somehow Grisha Yeager appeared and engaged Frieda Reiss in combat. Though Frieda possessed the powers of the Coordinate, she was eaten by Grisha. Grisha then proceeded to kill the rest of the Reiss bloodline, even the children, with only Rod escaping, blindly fleeing as his family was killed.

One day Rod came to get his daughter and inform her that she would be living with him from now on. Kenny Ackerman and the 1st Brigade of the Central Military Police intervened and swarmed around Historia and her mother. Kenny questioned if Rod was familiar with the two women, which he then denied. Rod watched as his mistress' throat was slit while she denied being Historia's mother. When the former serial killer moved in to kill Historia, Rod suddenly proposed having her enroll into the Survey Corps and hopefully die in battle. Seeing this as a fitting alternative the Central Military Police agreed to his demand. This was revealed later to be just a charade invented by him, as up until that point the MP making demands of the King seemed somewhat peculiar, and later on Kenny acknowledges having gone along with Rod's plan to get her into the Scouts. Presumably Rod left with the Military Police.

The Uprising arc
Rod is later seen siding with Kenny in a plan to kidnap Eren Yeager and Historia, eventually succeeding, keeping Eren chained in a dungeon of some sort. For reasons unknown he said he could not become a Shifter. Whether this is true or not, if this has something to do with the bloodline, or if it is just his personal choice, is unclear. His relationship with his brother, the host of the Coordinate before Frieda, who was apparently Kenny's benefactor, is unknown. He tries to convince Historia by telling her about the murder of her brothers and sisters at the hands of Eren's father (see above) and revealing to her the true nature of the power inside Eren, the Coordinate, which would allow her to stop the Titans once and for all. However, Historia asks why all the prior Kings and Frieda never did that if they had such power, and he answers that he does not know, and that the only way to know that is by inheriting their memories.

He compares the overwhelming power of the Coordinate with God and prays to her, as Uri once asked him to, while he subtly tries to inject the needle into Historia. However, she suddenly remembers Ymir's words about living with pride in her heart, which makes her throw both the needle and Rod as well, accusing him of trying to bribe her with lies.

Seeing his plan fail, he scrounges the fluid off the floor as he watches Historia free Eren, whispering that he will reunite with his father, Uri and Frieda. After ingesting it, he turns into a gigantic Titan, considered by Levi and Armin to be bigger than the Colossal Titan. The Titan is so big that it makes the whole cave crumble.

Rod Reiss' Titan then proceeds to ignore the Survey Corps members underneath the Reiss Chapel and begins crawling towards Orvud District of Wall Sina, hypothesized to be drawn there by the large number of humans in that area. Eren and other soldiers try to get its attention, but it is pointless. He cannot be stopped because of the enormous heat emanating from his body. He arrives there at dawn, when a group of Garrison and Survey Corps members are waiting for him on top of the Wall in order to kill it.

The Garrison fires a enormous barrage of cannon fire at Rod, both from the Walls and from the ground. The cannons cause great damage on his back, but he withstands all the attacks and scales the Wall. The intense heat of his body and the wind change force the soldiers to cover themselves in water to prevent from being burned. His hands are blown off by Squad Levi with a modified 3D Maneuver Gear attached to a gunpowder barrel, which makes him lose balance and fall over the Wall. After this, Eren, in his Titan form, shoves attached barrels of gunpowder into Rod's mouth, making a enormous explosion and blowing off his head and nape. This was a plan created by Erwin, who predicted that because of his crawling movement his face would be destroyed by the friction, his mouth would be wide open and finally the great heat of the Titan would light the gunpowder by itself. The flying pieces of his body are cut by Squad Levi in order to kill Rod Reiss' human body once and for all. Eventually the piece of his nape is found and cut by Historia, beheading her father and receiving some of his memories in the process, one of which being Rod asking his father to release them from the Titans rule.

Relationships

 * Historia Reiss - Rod is Historia's father, though she is an illegitimate child who is not accepted as a suitable heir to the Reiss family. Thus Kenny Ackerman was charged with her death and the death of Historia's mother. Rod came to get her to live with him, but the Military Police interfered and rather than take back his daughter, Rod was forced to propose an alternative where his daughter's chances of survival would be extremely low rather than see his daughter's death before his eyes. It is thus implied that Rod Reiss may actually care for his daughter. When Eren and Historia are captured, Rod Reiss embraces Historia with tears in his eyes, saying that he is sorry for what is happening, surprising Eren and Historia. The reason for this, may well be his intentions for one day giving Historia the powers of her half-sister. However, Historia refuses to comply with his wishes that she become a Titan and eat Eren, realizing that the power destroyed her sister's humanity and that Rod was only using her to get the Coordinate.
 * Frieda Reiss - It is implied that Rod loved his daughter over all things. When Historia rejected the serum, he became furious because of the loss of Frieda's memories and powers, and when he drinks the serum, he says that he will be reunited with his family and with her. In a memory, Frieda bravely told him to allow her to become the next holder, saying she wouldn't give in to her ancestors' ghosts.
 * Alma - At first she was Rod's servant but eventually she became his confidante and lover. When she got pregnant, she was taken away to her parent's farm. Rod thought that she was the only person that could understand what he was going through.

Trivia

 * Rod Reiss' Titan exposed it's internal organs when it stood up, due to all the skin and muscles being worn off as it dragged itself across the ground. However, his Titan showed digestive organs which Hange Zoë explained that other Titans lacked, such as a small intestine, as Titans have no form of waste, other than coughing up what they eat in "Titan vomit."