The King, otherwise known as Salem's Father, is a posthumous character from the American animated webseries RWBY, appearing in the story "The Girl in the Tower" of the book RWBY: Fairy Tales of Remnant and the episode of the same name from its animated series adaptation. In ancient times, he was the father of Salem, and did everything to keep her safe after the loss of her mother. However, he was betrayed by his daughter seeking freedom, and was later villainized in Salem's writings about her past.
He was voiced by Jeb-Aguilar Kendrick.
History
The king was once a simple, but noble hero and adventurer. During one of his adventures, he rescued a woman from raiders and they fell in love. After acquiring the kingdom and marrying the woman, she fell ill and died in childbirth. Stricken with grief, the king opted to keep his daughter, Salem, safe from anything that could ever hurt her. He kept her locked in her room in the castle tower, where her late mother used to come and look at the moon, though he loved and cherished her dearly and provided her with any gifts or material possessions she could ask for. Despite this, Salem longed to leave the tower and receive more attention from her paranoid father. She would later describe him as absent and materialistic, seeing her more as a possession than as a person and becoming greedy and self-serving with his other possessions. After reading books and learning of the world outside her tower, this desire grew stronger and stronger.
On her sixteenth birthday, Salem requested a pen and paper as a present, claiming she wanted to write her own books. Her father agreed, eager to hear what stories she would write. In actuality, Salem wrote notes about how her father was a tyrant and was keeping her imprisoned against her will, and sent the letters flying out the window, as only objects could pass through the magical barrier around her tower. Those who found copies of the story would go to save her by attacking the castle, and the king would have to defend his property by destroying them with magic.
Finally, a copy of the note found its way to the young warrior Ozma, who, wielding his own magic, attacked the castle and killed the king, freeing Salem. Salem and Ozma would run off to explore the world, though things would eventually go wrong when their paths and moral choices would lead them to become enemies.
Centuries later, Ozma's reincarnation Professor Ozpin realized that Salem had fabricated much of her story about her father being a tyrant, which she had penned into the fairy tale The Girl in the Tower. He would question how much of it was legitimate neglect or cruelty, and what were Salem's attempts to villainze her father's misguided paranoia and protectiveness to warrant sympathy.
