[OB] Why the Very Last Page Scene?

[Justin]

What is up with Wit in the very last page of OB? Wit tells the spren that he is “certain the reason he came to [Kholinar]” was to find the spren. This is odd for a few reasons.

 

    First, It is not really at Hoid level importance - The end of the last two books were important events that Hoid had to witness/be a part of. The first being Taln returning, proving to both the reader and people in world that Dalinar was right, and the final desolation was imminent. The Second was proving to the reader that Jasnah Kholin was alive, and important in world because Hoid had to put the future Queen (Or maybe still referred to as King) of Alethkar towards the tower and give her sketches of the Heralds, as well as bring her up to speed on current events. Obviously, this spren is important, because out of an entire Cosmere of places to be, Hoid goes to save it.

 

    Secondly, It seems like the Fused also know it is important. The Fused would not tell Moash why they were breaking apart the temple, but the wall that the spren was hiding in “was one of the few remaining”, so it can be assumed that the fused were literally tearing the city apart to search for it. The Fused in charge of the destruction of the temple has met Hoid before, and we are told that Odium would be willing to destroy the city in the off chance that he may kill Hoid. This means that saving the Spren put tens if not hundreds of thousands of people at risk, which is not something Hoid does lightly. I know he said he would watch the world burn to see his ends met, but he does seem like he would do it lightly, especially after putting time, energy, and investiture into saving just one little girl.

 

    Also, this may seem obvious, but the spren seems to be a cryptic, as it is described as “a pattern” and Hoid tells the spren that he knows many juicy truths.

 

    This can only mean that this cryptic is of vital importance, and cannot be dismissed out of hand. Does anybody have any clue as to why?

    

 

[+Wax]

I was just speculating on discord.  See, the king’s sword that Elhokar had 10 symbols on it for each order, making it unique.

Perhaps the sword had some significance to it related to the weilder, irrespective of the order.

 

[WalksIntoMordor]

One possibility - he has an idea as to the secrets that spren remembers, or will remember when it is bound. 

Alternatively, it was going to choose a king as its partner - perhaps it, like Syl, was a unique representation of its species that Hoid knew he had to get to.

[aemetha]

I don't think the specific cryptic is important except insofar as Hoid is meant to bond with it. The most important thing we've seen Hoid do in all his appearances is collect the magics of the various worlds. This is him collecting the magic of Roshar.

As to why a cryptic - because Hoid is a lightweaver. That's where he came from. He's the greatest lightweaver in the cosmere in all likelihood. A cryptic is the best fit to him.

[emailanimal]

I thought about this too.  The progression before the spren rescue to me reads like a "pet the dog" moment for Hoid - Brandon wants to send a message about who Hoid is, and alleviate our fears that he is some horrible monster on the inside.  The actual spren... There are two possible interpretations.

 

1. This is the object of the search.  

2. This is not the object of the search, but Hoid knows it's hiding there and wants it because he decided it is time to bond a spren.

 

In either case, I have a suspicion about the origins of the spren.  Recall that Elhokar died a Radiant. Recall also that the shadows he was seeing were Cryptics. Based on these two things, it is reasonable to assume that he was in the process of bonding a Cryptic. Then he was killed. This does things to spren, even if freshly bonded. Hoid now has bonded Elhokar's spren.

[Unknowingly]

I think that you are over thinking Hoids motivations for trying to bond the Cryptic. He has been shown to appear in places to collect the types of Investiture manifestations (Think the bead of Lerasium he took in WoA, and the Breaths he has). I suspect, since he can already Lightweave, he is most interested in acquiring the ability to use the Transformation Surge.

And, on what you said about him not throwing lives away lightly, there is no basis to see Hoid as someone who values Human life on a mass scale. Sure, we have seen him helping people, like the girl you mention or the Terris refugees he led to safety, but we have also seen him be present at the literal end of the world at the end of Hero of Ages, where thousands of people died if they weren't in the underground bunkers. And he did nothing to help. Hoid is an enigma that we do not understand, he is a complete wild card and we don't know his motivations at all, besides maybe hurting/stopping/killing odium. Because of this, I do not think that we can assume that we know what he is going to do, why he is going to do the things he does, or why they are important to him and why he is willing to forgo helping on a big scale to pursue his own goals.

We likely won't know these things until the Liar of Partinel/the Dragonsteel series releases.

[DiamondMind]

The Fused might be trying to get at one of the Unmade, per another theory. It's unlikely they would have cared about one Cryptic which had never fully bonded with a human. But I agree the spren was in the process of binding Elhokar. I'm still not quite sure why he would be so attractive to a Cryptic though.

[WhiteLeeopard]

One of the most curious things of Hoid bonding a spren is that from now on he will have a partner with him always. So far Hoid has always gone his own way, never tied to anyone. I'm surprised Hoid decided to do the huge commitment that is a nahel bond. Like the spren said in Shadesmar, its even more intimate than marriage ^^. 

[FollowYourMuse]

5 minutes ago, DiamondMind said:

I'm still not quite sure why he would be so attractive to a Cryptic though.

Aside from mentions by @aemetha above of granting lightweaving, a magic that Hoid already has a version of. As a storyteller it is the best surge for him.

Cryptics are attracted to lies, and desire truths to pogress, which are levels Hoid should be able to achieve, I have a feeling that other Orders levels might be more difficult for him. 

 

[+Bliev]

Remember that a Spren has to decide to give up its memories and cross over when it decides it wishes to bond. This Cryptic did so, but i think Hoid knew Elhokar would die, leaving it stranded, given Hoid a chance to gain a Nahel bond, collecting yet another form of magic/investiture. He had to do some storytelling and helping, though, to convince the spren to bond him—he has to attract it with what it’s looking for. I agree with @Unknowingly that we really can’t know Hoid’s intentions, aside from what he’s shown us already about his collection of magic. 

I also think that the Fused aren’t looking for the Cryptic, but that’s another theory/thread.

Edited November 18, 2017 by Bliev

[DiamondMind]

3 minutes ago, FollowYourMuse said:

Aside from mentions by @aemetha above of granting lightweaving, a magic that Hoid already has a version of. As a storyteller it is the best surge for him.

Cryptics are attracted to lies, and desire truths to pogress, which are levels Hoid should be able to achieve, I have a feeling that other Orders levels might be more difficult for him. 

 

Sorry, I meant why is Elhokar so attractive to a Cryptic.

[aemetha]

3 minutes ago, DiamondMind said:

Sorry, I meant why is Elhokar so attractive to a Cryptic

The lies. Cryptics are attracted to lies and especially self-deceit, and Elhokar tells himself many lies. "People are out to get me", "I can't trust anyone", "I have no real power" etc.

[+Bliev]

3 minutes ago, aemetha said:

The lies. Cryptics are attracted to lies and especially self-deceit, and Elhokar tells himself many lies. "People are out to get me", "I can't trust anyone", "I have no real power" etc.

I also think that it might have felt like Elhokar was becoming a squire to Shallan. She draws him the photo, she encourages him to think of himself differently, an illusion of sorts, and he begins to grow into that illusion, like shallan does.

[aemetha]

Lightweavers are also artists, but artists are very variable in their arts. Elhokar towards the end there was demonstrated considerable artistry when it comes to leading men and strategising, which is absolutely as much an art as drawing images and a very good fit to the way lightweaving influences people.

[FollowYourMuse]

4 minutes ago, DiamondMind said:

Sorry, I meant why is Elhokar so attractive to a Cryptic.

 

1 minute ago, aemetha said:

The lies. Cryptics are attracted to lies and especially self-deceit, and Elhokar tells himself many lies. "People are out to get me", "I can't trust anyone", "I have no real power" etc.

Elhokar also has been basically living a lie.  Pretending by trying to act like a king, when in actuality he has no skills or clue on being king. He had already started to admit his lies to himself and to others. 

 

 

[emailanimal]

44 minutes ago, Bliev said:

I also think that it might have felt like Elhokar was becoming a squire to Shallan. She draws him the photo, she encourages him to think of himself differently, an illusion of sorts, and he begins to grow into that illusion, like shallan does

Elhokar has been attracting Cryptics for a while. I was pretty sure he'd wind up becoming one in Oathbringer. Didn't expect to to be so dramatic and, well, life-ending...

He turned out to be a better person than one would expect based on the first two books. His journey was to face certain truths about himself, so Lightweaver is a reasonable Order for him.

[Yamahako]

I'm almost certain it has to do with Hoid deciding he needs to get in on the magic here.  In this same scene he utilizes breath to animate the doll - instead of just using an illusion - which I think was the tip off.

[TySun]

Speaking of the Hoid scenes at the end of each book, I would bet the reason Hoid was actually there when Taln arrived at the end of WoK was to replace the Heralds Honorblade with a regular Shardblade.

Edited November 19, 2017 by TySun

[Wandering Investor]

Based on several quotes from Hoid, he doesn't always know why he needs to do things. He's likely using Fortune to guide him, so we can't say saving the spren is a Hoid level event because Hoid doesn't pick and choose what he does. 

[dvoraen]

53 minutes ago, TySun said:

Speaking of the Hoid scenes at the end of each book, I would bet the reason Hoid was actually there when Taln arrived at the end of WoK was to replace the Heralds Honorblade with a regular Shardblade.

There's a WoB directly contradicting the idea that Hoid switched the blades:

The Ghostbloods or Sons of Honor, on the other hand...  It's also probably not beyond reason that the Sleepless or Stone Shamans could have gotten involved.  The latter would somehow reclaim an Honorblade from the death of a Truthless, so who's to say they couldn't use the same process for going after Taln's?

[Xavien]

4 hours ago, aemetha said:

As to why a cryptic - because Hoid is a lightweaver. That's where he came from. He's the greatest lightweaver in the cosmere in all likelihood. A cryptic is the best fit to him.

Hoid is also really big on the whole secrets and lies aspect of cryptics.  Even the name for that type of spren is a great adjective for him! It really is a perfect fit.

[What's a Seawolf?]

Based on how I understand the various magic systems Hoid has acquired work (and in relation to Surgebinding,) I assume Hoid now has unlimited access to Soulcasting.

He just needs to convert other Investiture, which I believe is fairly simple for someone of Hoid's knowledge and already acquired magic systems.

Anyone he goes from now on, he can essentially abuse (arguably) the most powerful surge on Roshar.

I just took that scene as a means to that end.

[marianmi]

Is it just me thinking that spren is not actually Elhokar's spren, but Sja-Anat?

EDIT: or maybe the 3rd Bondsmith spren?

Edited November 19, 2017 by marianmi

[Steeldancer]

It literally says a pattern. It's a cryptic 

Edited November 19, 2017 by Steeldancer

[desi_sparta]

Couple of points regarding Hood:

1) Before bonding with the cryptic, Hoid already has access to allomancy, feruchemy, breathes, and elantrian magic (he talks about his hair coming off in chunks, which we know, can be done by the chemical that the monk drank on Elantris)

2) Hoid also has access to the moon sceptre, which is kind of a Rosetta stone. I'm assuming one of its abilities is to provide the end user with access to all kinds of investiture.

Regarding the cryptics:

1) They have been looking at Elgokar for a long time now.

2) At his death, Elhokar was about to bond one

3) When Spren cross over, it's a leap of faith for them. They don't know if they'll ever bond anyone. And until they do, they roam around mindlessly. It's the same reason that the comet Spren that was following Eshonai around started following Venli around after her death. The Spren should not go back. The cryptic that Elhokar was about to bond, has already crossed over, and thus could not go back. It has to find another host.

Taking all this into account, it seems like Hoid enticed the Spren with truths to bond with him. Recall guys conversation with Shallan when he used lightweaving. He told her that the Shards on this planet are very strict. I interpret it as that while Hoid was able to imbibe in himself the magic from other planets by hacking or shortcuts (burning a bead instead of snapping, borrowing breathes already collected by everyone else, drinking a chemical instead of being born in Elantris), the only way he could get surgebinding is by bonding a Spren. That's why his Fortune took him to that palace.

 

Regarding the voidbringers, do note that their entire focus from the start had been on capturing Kholinar. And they were not tearing down the whole palace, just specific section of it. Seems to me that the enemy had knowledge of something hidden inside the palace at Kholinar which he really really wants and that's what the parshendi were searching for.

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