Welcome to my liveblog of Rhythm of War! Index post here. Beware of spoilers.

Chapter 23 (Binding Wounds)
Epigraph: Nothing to say.

Once again a good depiction of depression in its various stages and forms. Also a nod to chronic pain as experienced by Mil. 

Syl reading Kaladin’s book for him is cute. 

Jasnah takes time to soulcast medicine? That’s awesome, and a level of specificity/precision I might not have expected of soulcasting. I can’t wait for someone to bring that ability to bear in true medicinal chemistry or perhaps materials science. Want to test or prototype something new? No need to spend months or years figuring out how to synthesize it. Just call up your friendly neighborhood Elsecaller and ta-da!

The stormlight efficiency of oathgates depends on the level of the operating Radiant? That’s unexpected. Also, Jasnah does have plate, I guess. She just doesn’t show it off. I guess we’ll get to see it when she leads the army into battle.

The worldhopper flu strikes again! The Purelake Plague is underwhelming, both to me and to the surgeons of Roshar. Interesting that there were no analogs native to Roshar, though. So many things are described as giving flu-like symptoms because those respiratory infections behave similarly in many cases. I would not have thought the biome of Roshar to be so far removed from ours that none of their diseases follow the same pattern.

Plaguespren are a thing? As distinct from the rotspren that follow infections… that would be very useful epidemiologically, and it also makes me wonder again what sort of plagues Roshar gets.

I am not sure whether Teft is primarily following Kaladin out of loyalty here or if Kaladin’s recusal has given his followers tacit permission to admit they aren’t okay and need mental health support. I mean, both are happening and both are good. I hope this will prove a benefit to the rest of the Order, but for Teft, which one is the driving factor here? I’m inclined to guess the second, but the first is his excuse to himself… but we’ll see. Hmm, Kaladin seems to agree with me, at least, but he’s hardly an objective narrator.

Quote

“That’s Kelek’s own truth.”

--another construction similar to swears even if it doesn’t strictly fit the category. I’ll add it to the list.