Warning: This entry may contain spoilers for Elden Ring. Read at your own caution.

About

Rya also known as Zorayas is a non-player character in the 2022 video game Elden Ring published by Fromsoftware and released on February 25th, 2022. The character has become prominent within the game's community for her naïve, innocent charm and form switching during the game where she later reveals herself to be an anthropomorphic snake.

Origin

Rya is first met in the Liurnia of the Lakes zone, which is often the third zone visited by players after they defeat Godrick the Grafted and exit Stormveil Castle. Rya first appears sheepish and asks the player to retrieve her necklace for her after it was stolen by another NPC. After completing the first steps of her quest, she thanks the player and invites them to Volcano Manor, which is in the next zone of the game, Altus Plateau. After progressing through her questline, she will transform into a friendly snake-like character with her kind mannerisms and speech still intact. On March 4th, 2022, the YouTube channel The Depressed Hollow^[1] uploaded a video in which he is seen talking to the snake form of Zorayas, which he calls "Cute Snake Lady," earning 482,000 views in two months (shown below).

Spread

Players began creating fan art and memes of Rya shortly after the launch of the game in late February 2022, with one of the first memes being posted to the /r/EldenRing subreddit on March 22nd, 2022,^[2] making fun of Rya's bad posture in the game, earning over 5,500 upvotes in one month (shown below).

On May 5th, 2022, the iFunny user wubs^[3] uploaded a meme in which someone is listing a longform multi-paragraph answer as to why they like Malenia, whereas the only reason needed for why to like Zorayas was that she's nice (shown below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References