Rita Mordio

Rita Mordio (リタ・モルディオ) is a researcher who studies blastia and hates to be interrupted during her research. She is eccentric and has a poor social disposition.

History
Contrary to what her young age would make one believe, Rita is actually one of the most intelligent mages of Aspio, the city of scholars. Despite this, she was treated as a weirdo due to her obsession with research and with blastia. When Yuri Lowell first inquired about the famed mage, Mordio, Aspio residents were in awe as to "why he wanted to see that weirdo." It is explained later in the game that the reason for her obsession was that her research was all she had due to her status as an orphan and her lack of any friends or family. Her lack of social skills also stems from the fact that she always had to worry about herself instead of taking the time to socialize with others, and thus was not used to having friendly relationships. To add to the oddness, there is also something in her dresser than even Estelle is shocked about. Although there are many theories about what was in Rita's dresser, it is never found out for sure. In the end credits, it shows that Rita has continued to be a researcher, conducting experiments with chemicals and flying around in a device of her own build. She flies by Estelle and is later seen having tea with her, indicating that she maintains her friendship with the princess. At the end, the entire gang is seen at a reunion.

Fighting Style
Rita's primary weaponry is made up of scrolls and whips, with books taking a secondary place. Her best weapon for physical attack is the "Ivy Blade", whereas the "Aspion" is preferred for magical attack. As Rita is a token mage character, her main offense is provided through a large arsenal of spells, accompanied by a small selection of melee artes. She is able to use spells that primarily focus on four of the six elements: Fire, Water, Earth, and Darkness. Her mystic artes include Ancient Catastrophe as well as Indignation in the PS3 port of Tales of Vesperia. Of particular note is Rita's powers when paired with any level of Over Limit in Tales of Vesperia, as Over Limit allows the immediate casting of any spell. The ability can be paired with powerful area spells such as Tidal Wave or Meteor Storm as well as powerful single target spells such as Violent Pain to wreak havoc on the enemy.

Relationships
Despite her cold-hearted attitude, Rita has made friends with most of her group, specifically with Estelle, who saw past Rita's harsh exterior. Over time, Rita became quite taken with Estelle's kind demeanor and optimistic, positive attitude, and eventually became very protective over the Princess. Though Rita won't admit it, she cares about Estelle very much and doesn't want to ever see her hurt and becomes the closest person to a best friend she has.

Because of the problem between her and Yuri Lowell, they do not have as many interactions. Like with everyone else, Yuri is normally sarcastic with Rita. His apology wasn't very convincing either. However, as the game goes on, Yuri and Rita seem to form a relatively strong friendship. Later in the story, when Yuri was injured and went missing after the events at Zaude, Rita passively claimed to have "looked all over" for him, trying to sound as if the task had been annoying. However, Estelle and Judith notice that Rita is happy that Yuri is okay and comment on it, resulting in her embarrassment. Rita is also one of the few people that Repede has taken an interest in. At first, she is afraid of him, and has even admitted that she would never eat any gels that were in his mouth. She refers to him as just "the dog" or "the pooch" in the first half, but she eventually begins to compliment him, and use his name in the third part of the game.

Her relationship with Karol Capel is more humorous than anything else. Karol is actually nothing more than Rita's punching bag. Whenever Karol acts up, she is quick to give him a smack in the head to set him straight. She has also smacked him when he almost squealed, gave something a stupid name, and just because he was there when she was freaked about ghosts. Also, in a sidequest at Nam Cobanda Isle where the group act out a play, she used her spells to set Karol's head on fire to make up for the "lame special effects". Despite this, she does warm to him somewhat as the story progresses.

Though Karol is her usual punching bag, Raven is pretty close behind. Whenever he says anything even remotely perverted, she is quick to deal a brutal punch, kick, slap, and sometimes even a spell, to knock him over or send him flying. The two seem to love to annoy each other, and are frequently engaged in sarcastic banter. However, Rita does seem to hold at the very least a shred of care for him. When the group was forced to fight him, she shouted rather emotionally that she hated him. But when he appeared to have died after saving their lives, she almost broke down in tears when she tried explaining what happened to Leblanc. Later, when he unexpectedly rejoined them without noticeable injury, the party proceeded to pummel him, with Rita delivering the strongest blow.

Rita's relationship between her and Judith saw the greatest changes throughout the story's progression. At first, without even knowing it, Judith was just a "dragon freak" that destroyed her precious blastia. When Rita finally discovered Judith's secret identity, she told Yuri that she was going to beat Judith to a pulp if she saw her again. When the group met up with Judith again, she explained the reasons for her actions. Rita had a quick change of heart and decided to help Judith on her quest to stop Hermes blastia, realizing the danger of them.

Tales of Vesperia: The First Strike
Rita made a cameo appearance in First Strike. She was mentioned to Niren Fedrock by his strategist Garista. Niren wanted information from her on some aer that went out of control near Shizontonia, and in exchange he would give her a rare blastia core. She then explains that it was unlikely aer could go out of control, and suddenly she remembered that a barrier blastia in the ruins upstream lost its core and that there was no aer krene there either. She then answered a question Chastel Aiheap asked about what an aer krene was and came to a conclusion that someone inserted a core in the blastia to produce more aer and then explained that, if used incorrectly, the results would be catastrophic.

Niren then asked her if it was possible to destroy the blastia but she said there was no way of knowing how unless she saw what kind of core was used to power it and asked if the aer was red. As a blastia expert she states the only way is to stop it at the source. To help them, she gave him a blastia that absorbed aer from the source and told him all he had to do was place it near the source and activate it, and a warning that since it is also a blastia it could overload. After he gave her the core she asked how he and Chastel found her and he explained that Garista told him where to look for her. She reveals that he had stolen countless blastia from her and turned them into weapons. She then used a device to create a formula that would temporarily prevent all blastia attached with it from overloading due to the red aer. She also suggested that his unit should stop the aer flow right away or the town would be destroyed. Before Niren and Chastel left, he asked her if she lived alone. To which she replied that the house she was living in was only a temporary laboratory and that she lived somewhere else, referencing Aspio.

Tales of VS.
Rita appears in Tales of VS. as a magician from the Free City Union of Dyne, looking for a lot of mana. She is paired up with Judith from her original game. She plays no real significance during the story that much, but she does appear in most of the story modes as a opponent. During the events of Jade's story mode, Dhaos from Tales of Phantasia creates a replica of her and Judith to fight Jade Curtiss and Anise Tatlin.

Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology 3
In Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology 3, Rita is introduced together with Yuri and Estelle after the story mission against Saleh. During most of the events in the game, she and Harold Berselius try to understand the documents that have been acquired by the Ad Libitum, in order to find a way to revert Lazaris's reformation of Luminatia before it is complete. In the final two story missions, after collecting all of the necessary documents, Rita, the Protagonist, and Kanonno Grassvalley return to the Holy Land of Randgriz to find the second vortex that connects the World Tree. As they attempt to revert the situation, the process fails and their efforts are wasted as the reformation is now closer to its final stage.