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So let’s talk Renarin, shall we? Now, if you fine folks are anything like myself, you might have found yourself confused by some of the reveals that Oathbringer brought about regarding Renarin and his powers. This was a twist that I saw coming a long way off, and so I was more than ready when we found out that Renarin had been affected by a voidish corruption and that this was the reason for his strange and ominous visions. If you’d like to see how WoR foreshadowed this moment, you can check out my theory Renarin’s Visions and Truthwatching and see all the reasoning for this twist. However, what I want to do here today is get into the nitty gritty of what’s really going on. Is Renarin a Voidbinder or a Surgebinder or both? Is Glys a Voidspren? How do the visions work? How did this happen? All those good questions are the ones that I’d like to try to tackle here. Theory Disclaimer: Most of these things have not been confirmed in canon and Brandon has been cagey about answering or confirming. However, this explanation is the one which seems most plausible to me based on the evidence at hand. So let me do a bullet point run-down of what I think is happening: Glys is actually a valid Truthwatcher spren, not a voidspren. Renarin is a valid Truthwatcher Radiant and therefore a Surgebinder with access to the surges of Progression and Illumination. Renarin uses Stormlight to power his surges, just like other Radiants. Glys has been corrupted by the Unmade Sja-anat. As a result of this corruption, in addition to his normal Truthwatcher powers, Renarin is afflicted by involuntary visions of the future which neither he nor Glys can control. The points above are those that I feel are fairly concrete, and I’ll go into the reasoning behind those ideas later below. However, upon this assumed situation, I believe that the following ideas are viable possibilities. The following points are less certain than those above, but these are the ideas that seem the most plausible to me, given the circumstances: The powers that the Fused display are expressions of Voidbinding. Renarin’s future visions are possibly also an expression of Voidbinding, but his other powers are not. If Renarin’s Voidbinding and Fused Voidbinding work in the same way, it is possible that all Voidbinding powers come from the influence of the Unmade, in that Sja-anat can grant Voidish future visions while other Unmade grant different powers, like illusions, frictionlessness, or gravity, as we see other Fused use. And upon these assumptions, we find several questions arise regarding the nature of the situation: If both Renarin and the Fused are Voidbinders, is a spren involved in the granting of Voidbinding powers to the Fused in the same way they were granted to Renarin? If Voidish powers are each affiliated with an Unmade, why are there seemingly 10 powers on the Voidbinding chart if there are only 9 Unmade? Does Odium grant a Bondsmith equivalent himself? If Voidbinding powers are not granted by the Unmade, how are they gained? In what way are Renarin and the Fused similar in situation that grants them the same powers? What caused the hypergraphia that accompanied the visions of the Everstorm, and why does that no longer happen when Renarin gets visions? All of which are fascinating, but unfortunately, more likely to get a RAFO than an answer in a signing line. The first I have already asked and been RAFO’d and I believe the others are going to be answered similarly, if attempted. If I had to guess, these are reveals that will happen in Renarin’s flashback book. Considering that book is in the back five, we’ve probably got a while to wait. Alas. Regardless, no use fretting over the information we don’t have when it’s so much more fun to dissect the information we do have. And Oathbringer certainly gave us plenty to dissect. So, let’s take the situation that I’ve outlined above and break it down with some textual evidence to help explain where these ideas come from. Glys the Truthwatcher spren and Renarin the Radiant This is one of the easiest points to guess, considering the wealth of information we have on the topic. A lot of this is due to the Renarin point of view chapters in Part 5. (Thank you, Brandon, I owe you my soul for those.) Renarin’s surges seem to work perfectly normally. He heals people with Regrowth at several points in the novel, fairly naturally. I believe we see a slight, unconscious use of Illumination in the scene with Adolin and Gallant, when Renarin makes a perfected vision of Adolin appear. Renarin also mentions trying to train with Shallan in using Illumination, but he has difficulty with it. Now, it could be assumed that Renarin’s failure to grasp Illumination is a sign that his surges are wrong, and yet I think this is simply another example of a Radiant finding one surge more easy to pick up than another. Shallan is naturally better at Illumination than Transformation. Lift is better at Abrasion than Progression. It seems common enough that Radiants have an affinity for one of their surges over the other. For Renarin, I believe this is that Progression is easier than Illumination. In addition to his surges, Renarin’s other expressions of Radiant abilities seem normal. Glys is able to form as a Shardblade, which no one deems as looking out of the ordinary. It also functions to open Oathgates. His healing factor works as the other Radiants’, albeit augmented by his power of Progression to make healing extremely rapid. Most tellingly, his powers use Stormlight, just as all the others do. Ivory says that there is a rightness to the bond between Renarin and Glys and that spren of Odium should not be able to bond with humans under normal circumstances. Through all of these things, one can assume that Renarin and Glys have a valid Nahel bond and are bonded as Radiant and spren, just as the others are. Sja-anat’s Corruption However, in addition to the normal suite of a Truthwatcher’s powers and the Nahel bond, there is another factor in the mix: Sja-anat. When Sja-anat speaks with Shallan she speaks of her son when telling Shallan that she is not an enemy, as though he would vouch for her. This is undoubtedly Glys. It’s interesting to note that this seems to indicate that Glys is working with Sja-anat, possibly willingly. Perhaps she approached a Radiant spren hoping that by giving changing one of them, she would have an ally who would help the Radiants trust her. Or perhaps it’s something else. Hard to say at this point. Regardless, it is because of this that Renarin can see the future, and why he is consumed with visions. Though it is possible that other Truthwatchers have a manner of foresight, I don’t believe it would manifest as Renarin’s does. Ivory states that future sight is a power of Odium, as the Vorins believe. I believe Sja-anat has been hoping to swap sides and is using Glys as a way to do it, as well as helping Shallan instead of killing them when they went through the Oathgate. Voidbinding So in the end, what is Voidbinding? Hard to say with certainty, since despite how often we see Voidbinders, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of answers about it. Working under the assumption that the Fused’s powers are Voidbinding we can see a few things, at least: Voidbinding seems to line up with surges in many cases, as we see Fused manipulating gravity and friction, just like Kaladin and Lift. It’s hard to tell if this means that Renarin’s corrupted sight is also a form of Voidbinding as well, since it doesn’t seem to line up with a Surge the way the others are. The Listener Song of Secrets speaks of Nightform, a form of power which can see the future, which seems as though it might be more similar to what Renarin can do than anything else we’ve seen. The question is, Renarin is getting his void-powers from a corrupted spren, but I don’t believe that the Fused have a corrupted spren giving them powers, which initially made me think that Renarin’s visions were not Voidbinding like the Fused. Now, I’m not so sure. For the moment, I think I will lean toward the idea that Renarin’s visions and the powers of the Fused are both Voidbinding somehow, even if we don’t have details to confirm anything either way. There’s just not enough answers for the moment. Time will tell. If anyone can get answers out of Brandon regarding this topic, I’d be greatly appreciative but I doubt he’s going to answer things. Conclusion There’s a lot that we just don’t know yet, but I’m excited to see where this goes in the future. For now, this is my best guess at what’s really going on until we get some more information on all of it. One thing that hasn’t changed is that I adore Renarin with all of my heart and somehow Brandon continues to write his plotline and character arc in ways which are intensely fascinating to me. Oathbringer has been a triumph and I can’t wait to see what’s in store!

What if the first letter is written by the shard that wants to "hide and survive"? I saw a thread posted earlier from @WeiryWriter that posited that Shard should/would be Wisdom (or some variant of that concept) which I think is a great idea! Why Wisdom as a Shard seems to be the writter of the first OB letter to me: To me, in agreement with @Argent, the letter has a "femnine" sound to it, and Wisdom historically has strong associations with the feminine divine (Sophia, Athena, female personification of wisdom in the hebrew proverbs, and others!) Hiding and Surviving is the wise thing to do... and to do that you need to be the only Shard on a planet! Much of the language in the first letter relates to wisdom or the opposite of that (foolishness) "they were foolish" re: Aona & Skai "chance to be more" - missed (foolishly) opportunity "no good can come" - wise foresight "disappoints me" - other shards make foolish decisions related to interaction "obvious she was going to be a problem" - wisdom can see problems with unchecked Ambition (if you follow that argument, which I do) And to get a little more geeky... wisdom in most RPG's is associated with perceptive/intuitive abilities "i noticed...immediately"/"noticed your many"/"my eyes are not...clouded by..." so yeah... I think the first letter is our "hide/survive" shard Wisdom. Now, how did Hoid find her is a better question to me!

I managed to get my copy of Oathbringer a bit early and have been thinking and trying to make sense of Dalinar's awesome transformation at the end. In crafting a theory to explain this, I made a list of some important details and thought I would share those with y'all in the hope of a good discussion: Important Details: UNITE THEM! - Chapter 119 - I'll start off with the obvious detail, when Dalinar freaking grabs the fabric of reality with his hands and merges the Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual realms together into a perpendicularity. We've had tidbits of perpendicularities in Arcanum Unbound and different things but to my knowledge, we've never seen anyone short of a Shard or splinter do something this powerful in the Cosmere as of yet. According to the Arcanum Unbounded, this generally requires "concentration of so much Investiture" that "creates points of ... friction, where a kind of tunneling exists". As far as I know, only Shards themselves have caused this in the past and it seems well outside the powers of a bondsmith so the question is how is Dalinar doing this? Syl says its Honor's perpendicularity so we at least know that it is Honor's power that Dalinar is wielding somehow. Whatever this power is, Dalinar seems to be able to do it on command now since he overcharged Kaladin with Stormlight in Chapter 122 before Kaladin takes off to find his missing bridgemen. I am Unity - Chapter 119 - When asked what he is by Venli, Dalinar responds with the awesome phrase "I am Unity", which could have many interpretations. Is this referring to his overall goal of unifying? Is it simply a cool way of leading into his unifying the Realms? Or is the capitalization of Unity important and does that signify that Dalinar has become something far more? WE KILLED YOU! - Chapter 119 - Perhaps my favorite detail is Odium's reaction to Dalinar's epiphany. Not only is Odium shocked by Dalinar's resistance, he seems to be downright scared here. And most interesting is the choice of pronouns here. In their previous discussion regarding Dalinar's sins, Odium always said "I" as in "I was there, influencing you", so this doesn't seem to be a royal "we". With the available information, I can see two possible explanations. One, Honor's death was a cooperative effort between Odium and some other party such as Autonomy though this seems unlikely since all of our evidence so far indicates that Odium killed Tanavast by himself. Second, and more intriguing, is the shattering of Adonalsium, which seems to better explain the anger, outrage, and fear in Odium's statements. What about Dalinar's Unity frightens Odium so much? What does Dalinar look like to Odium's eyes? How? What have you done? - Chapter 119 - Despite being the Cognitive shadow of a god, the Stormfather has no clue what or how Dalinar just accomplished. Is this just the typical Spren forgetfulness since he hasn't been bonded in millennia? Their later conversation seems to indicate that this really hasn't been done before... We are something different - Chapter 119 - Dalinar's own words to describe this event are "We are something different. His remnants, your soul, my will". This is interesting to me since it could be interpreted in a realmatic context as the combination of Physical (his remnants), Cognitive (my will), and Spiritual (your soul) components though the remnants seems like it should really be of all three and not just Physical. Dalinar was not supposed to Ascend - Chapter 122 - Another Odium line that stands out since the topic of Ascension has a known definition within the Cosmere: a vessel taking up a Shard of Adonalsium like in the Mistborn series. The context of this phrase is a bit murky though since Odium and Mr. T are talking about events in the past, present, and future so it's a bit unclear whether this is directly referring to Dalinar's display or if it is some future event that both Odium and Mr. T have foreseen. Still, this clearly indicates to me that something major is going on with Dalinar and it seems like Odium thinks that this is not a one-hit wonder use of power on his part. Interesting side note is how the heck do y'all think the "Renarin Kholin" reference fits into this conversation? Was he the one who should have Ascended or was he the catalyst that caused Dalinar's Ascension (perhaps in that one flashback where Renarin breaks Dalinar out of his drinking and makes him realize a bit how awful he is being)? A warmth that he had known once before - Chapter 119 - Right before Dalinar Unites, he feels this weird warmth. As far as I can tell, this seems to refer to Dalinar's curious dream/vision in Ch 89 of WoR, where he seemingly relives a childhood moment before stepping outside where "warm light bathed him. A deep, enveloping, piercing warmth. A warmth that soaked down deep through his skin, into his very self. He stared at that light, and was not blinded. The source was distant, but he knew it. Knew it well. He smiled". Still don't have a good explanation for what's going on here but we do have confirmation a few pages later that the Stormfather did not send this. Since all of Dalinar's previous interactions with Honor have been mediated by the Stormfather, what could this warmth be? Unite them - Throughout all books, Dalinar's thoughts are almost always drawn to a single phrase "Unite them" that has driven a lot of his actions so far. Presumably, the first instance of this was the vision that Honor/Stormfather gave him but it continues to be repeated time and time again in Dalinar's viewpoints. It's a phrase that has been interpreted to mean many things over the books like "unite the highprinces", "unite the world", and "unite the radiants" but here we see it once again in probably the most spectacular fashion as he physically unites the realms. Are these words just Dalinar's continual introspection on these words or is this an external voice speaking to him? The Stormfather said it wasn't him in Chapter 111 and Dalinar definitely perceived it to be an external voice. Was it always an external voice or just this time? Who or what could this be? Theories: Looking at the available evidence, I have come up with three possible explanations for the power that Dalinar is wielding now: Dalinar has, or is in the process of, reforming Honor and is its new vessel - I believe we have some WoB that this is possible but very difficult. The "something different" and "we killed you" details seem like they dispute this but either one could be interpreted to support it. Syl claiming that the perpendicularity is Honor's does seem to support this however. Another possibility is that he has somehow accumulated enough of Honor's Investiture to become something like a mini-sliver like a Herald or above. Dalinar has somehow accumulated enough Investiture to become something new, Unity - Perhaps not a full Shard but something akin to or above a Herald in power and not necessarily linked with Honor alone. At this point, he's had direct interactions with three Shards/remnants of Shards, which seems unique, and could somehow have taken some measure of power from each. To be specific, Odium has been shaping him into a Champion for what seems like his entire life and likely had to sink some Investiture in him to do so. Cultivation took a piece of him and perhaps gave something in its place when he visited. And we all know that he has a big piece of Honor in his pocket in the form of the Stormfather. Syl's claim that the perpendicularity was Honor's could just be her best guess or it could be that the bulk of Dalinar's new power is of Honor and that's what she's sensing. Has the combination of all of this Investiture made him into something unique? I think this is the most likely theory though the "we killed you" detail doesn't seem to quite fit. Dalinar is, in some way, connected to Adonalsium on a deeper level than we thought - This is a bit more out-there than the other two theories and is predicated mostly on the "we killed you" detail. I think there's a WoB out there somewhere that Dalinar was one of the first characters of the SA that Brandon came up with (number 17 here) and this makes me curious. I'm probably reading too much into this random detail but could Dalinar be something like the reincarnation of Adonalsium? We've had absolutely no evidence of this before now but it kinda fits the fear in Odium's reaction to Dalinar's Ascension. Of course, I would expect a god to pick up on that fact if he's been watching and influencing a dude for most of his life but maybe there's more going on than we know? There was also that curious exchange between Wit and Dalinar in WoK regarding Adonalsium (Chapter 54) that could support this theory but there's a WoB (number 1 here) saying that was probably not that significant. Building off the previous theory, perhaps Odium interprets Dalinar's combination of the three Shard's Investiture as a preliminary attempt to reforge Adonalsium.

I'm pretty sure Timbre is Captain Ico's daughter.

Hello all! Long time reader but first time poster here I'm so glad this thread started. Since finishing OB I've been obsessing over various aspects of the story but particularly this one. Now I was a Shalladin shipper so bear with me given my previous preferences, but having read the book over the course of a single day, finishing at 2am, I was very tired and honestly felt really low at the conclusion, and this element of the story was definitely the cause. I am sure with a re-read, more time, and hopefully some discussion here I'll resolve some of my issues! So in advance, thank-you for your thoughts and feelings. Also, this is long so I'm really sorry. So an an obsessive fan, I'd actually written out my thoughts on the progression of the Shadolin/Shalladin relationships as they stood at the end of WoR. I didn't have a specific preference before I wrote that essay but by the end, as many people have pointed out, I was sure there was so much more foreshadowing for Shalladin that I firmly ended up in that camp. To be clear, I like Adolin. He's awesome. But unlike some, my major concern for Shadolin is that the relationship is not only not ideal for Shallan, it's not good, and may even be destructive to Adolin. I don't want him to go dark and I am genuinely worried that he will now. Think about it this way, he knows or at least should, that a part of Shallan (ie Veil) doesn't love him. Yikes. If my SO told me that I'd be devastated. Hell, if I felt that way about my SO I'd be devastated. This doesn't make Shalladin any better of course, I'm not clear on each of Shallan's persona's feelings towards Kaladin. Obviously Veil likes him. Radiant seems the pragmatic one and prefers Adolin for reasons aside from emotion (ie he's a highprince, can teach her to use PatternBlade, enables her etc). But the Shallan persona (who I'm not convinced is any more "real" than the others) seems to like them both in different ways, BUT as of end of WoR she actually compares them, and Kaladin wins out, almost despite herself. I don't think Shallan should have married Adolin at this point, but, importantly, I am not inherently upset she didn't choose Kaladin - he simply doesn't need the drama she will bring by being so broken. That said, I don't think the whole thing is concluded. Lets look at the pre-wedding scene; Shallan wears sapphire (unusual - we know the traditional Vorin colour for weddings is red). Now I am probably reading too much into this, but sapphire is the colour of the Windrunners. She could have worn any other colour. Why sapphire? I trust Sanderson not to put these kind of things in at random (although if Shalladin doesnt get any progression I may change my mind on this given the amount of work was put into it) and he specifically chose the colours for the different orders, something he took time over when researching. He could easily have made her wear the traditional red, which would have been appropriate for a Lightweaver, or Kholin Blue as she's joining the Kholin house. But no, he chooses, and makes a point of telling us, its sapphire. Not even just blue. Kaladin sends her the boots, the perfect choice to make her feel less nervous and relieve some of the tension. Its been a long running theme between them, both in banter but also in fairly subtle subtext. No other gift does this for her. Pattern says "Mmm... This is a good you, Shallan." (emphasis mine). Not 'this is good for you' or 'this is you, Shallan'. Pattern likes lies, is this image of her a lie? It isn't clear, but he seems to know this is simply another version. Shallan brings out Veil and Radiant. She stills identifies as all three in some way. They haven't gone away, they still linger as options for her. Like many others here, I'm not convinced this is a good thing. Veil specifically says "He's good for you" (emphasis mine) - notice it is good for the Shallan persona, not for "us". She goes on to say "We could do far worse". Well that's flattering. About a third of Shallan thinks she could could do worse than a storming prince....? Even Radiant implicitly agrees as she says "But not much better" in reply - well that implies there is something better. What does that "pointed look" mean. The surface thought is that she's trying to stop Veil from pushing Shallan out of this union but there is a second reading - The best thing for Shallan, both as a person, and in terms of her progressing as a radiant would be to accept all three of these personas as aspects of her full personality, this is not good for Radiant or Veil as they would lose their individuality and autonomy. Adolin essentially allows Shallan to feel safe, and allows Veil and Radiant to keep existing. Great..... Finally, we get a letter from Mraize. Mraize has always thought "Veil" was the real person here, and refers to her as little knife - the term he uses for Shallan/Veil. This reinforces the idea that this is the real her. She pushes the thought away and goes to celebrate "being herself" . Basically I am not convinced this is entirely true. I mean, how much of Shallan's truth here can be trusted. Ok some final thoughts. Shallan is a level 4 Lightweaver. She still has one more truth to reveal to become a full Radiant. This is likely to happen either towards the end of book 4, or (more likely imo) in book 5. Now this could be regarding how she became a surgebinder (presumably her family was pretty nasty even before she killed her mother) but that seems to have been implicitly understood at this point. My feeling is that she needs to accept that she is all of these women and stop hiding parts of herself away - she needs to accept her flaws etc and that she is not infallible. Interestingly, accepting the truth of situations seems to be part of all of the orders. Kaladin struggles to accept the truth that he cannot save everyone - indeed he can't progress because of it. Truth, or at least the subjective aspect of it, is important in the cognitive realm, although the Cryptics seem to take this to an extreme. Granted, we only have evidence for the WR and LW but accepting the truth of your own flaws and accepting that failure is a part of your journey is incredibly important for all people, not just Radiants. Shallan has not accepted this - so she created personas to overcome the inherent weaknesses of her personality. It seems like a strength but overall true strength comes from accepting that you cannot be perfect. So do I still ship Shalladin? Well, kinda, I cant believe that the huge amount of foreshadowing we got will lead to no payoff whatsoever, but if Sanderson chooses not to go there, in some ways I'll be relieved. I want Kaladin to be happy but after OB I'm not convinced that Shallan will make him so, particularly in her current state. Do I ship Shadolin? Well no, but not because I don't want Adolin to be happy - I do. I just think Shallan might actually make him unhappy and I don't think Adolin deserves that.

Adolin lets her be her. He doesn't need or want her to be anything else. That's everyone's reaction to Kaladin. It's not Shallan specific. It's what Kaladin is. Sure he's a protector, but even more than that, he's a leader. He inspires others to be better than they were. This will be IMO where his next Ideals will go.

My guess would be: "I cannot save everyone, but I will save those I can".

Completely agree. I'm a big fan of Sanderson's work, and one of the things I love is that he writes a lot of great and varied female protagonists, which is sadly STILL something of a rarity in the genre. But we've now had Elantris, Warbreaker, Shadows of Self, Bands of Morning, Words of Radiance, and now Oathbringer where the success of arranged marriage is actually a major plot point. And yeah, I'm not a female reader, but as a feminist this is starting to bother me. The whole Laral parable in particular seemed a little off. That exchange got almost as much focus as Kaladin learning he had a brother! Seriously? Why was it important to emphasize that she was just peachy marrying an old man (someone who by rights is basically a murderer)?! The more I think about it the more it irritates me to be honest. A related issue is how female many characters end up "settling down" with literally the first person they have ever been in a relationship with, even when it is not actually an arranged marriage. Siri and Susebron. Sarene and Raoden. Vin and Elend. Laral and Lord Piece-of-rust. Shallan and Adolin. Each one of these is essentially a Disney princess storyline, where the romantically naive and virginal young girl marries royalty. I actually cannot think of a single female protagonist's love interest (meaning married or explicitly in a romantic relationship by the end) in the cosmere books that is not a nobleman, prince, or god-king... But back to Oathbringer. The romances here bother me because they seem to more blatantly peddle the whole arranged marriage = good trope, in a way that feels a little disingenuous. The Shallan/Kaladin/Adolin dynamic is set up as the classic love triangle. You've got the (again romantically naive, virginal) young woman choosing between the passionate, dangerous, "bad-boy" option, and the loving, romantic, "safe" option. This is clearly set up by the fact that Veil, Shallan's "street" persona with "terrible taste in men" keeps focusing on Kaladin and his wildness/passion. Adolin is described as the guy who "knows the real her" and always makes her feel safe. Classic trope. Except...that makes absolutely zero sense here. How is Kaladin the "dangerous" option? His biggest character flaw (after "getting over" his completely rational hatred of an oppressive class structure) is literally not being able to stop himself from trying to protect everybody! That and he is grumpy (mostly as the result of, you know, clearly battling chronic depression). He is the only character of the main protagonists to have a serious moral crisis about killing the Singers BEFORE it is revealed that, whoops, humans are the Voidbringers after all. Adolin, the "nice guy," has killed Parshendi without remorse for years, and still doesn't seem to have much of a problem with it in this book. But still we have this repeated reference to Kaladin's "passion" which is obviously meant to parallel the reveal that Odium is the god of Passions, and sets Kaladin up metaphorically as the "dangerous" choice in the love triangle, when in fact Adolin almost certainly has a MUCH higher body count and seems to feel less bad about it too. He also passionately murders Sadeas basically right after Kaladin makes a vow to protect people according to what is right and not according to his passions. And aside from the amount of murder that each guy has done, we also know that Adolin has courted a comically large number of women in the warcamps, and it is implied that at least a few of those relationship ended because of him essentially cheating on the woman (or not treating them very well in one way or another). This is written off as him just not having found the right person yet. Kaladin, meanwhile, is implied to have been in exactly one relationship, which ended because she moved away and he felt it was his duty to stay in the army and protect people. My point is not that Shallan should end up with Kaladin. I actually think it would have been awesome if the three of them were just close friends. I think this would have been much more in character for Shallan, frankly. My point is just that the triangle was written in such a way that there needed to be an excuse for why Adolin, the arranged spouse, was the "right" or "safe" choice. In other words, there couldn't be two viable choices that Shallan was legitimately torn between. One (Kaladin) had to be artificially presented as the "wrong" choice based in Veil's "horrible taste in men." In essence, it robs Shallan of agency because it frames it as though there is only one "genuine" choice for her. The reason given for her not to choose Kaladin could frankly apply equally well if not more so to Adolin. But this is ignored in favour of what is more or less the classic Disney princess ending. I'll point out again that I love the actual characters involved. I just feel like in this situation they were forced into romantic archetypes and tropes in which they really, really didn't fit. And it does seem like this was done to fit into a broader trend that, as @firegazer said, is a little bit troubling.

I'm... actually pretty sure lightspren are the Willshaper spren. Suppose it's a separate topic, but saw that and felt it necessary to address.

Posted this already in the Stormlight form, but I asked Brandon 2 serious questions and one silly one. First was for my copy of Edgedancer: "Tell me something I wouldn't know about Lift" Answer: "She sometimes doesn't like Foods, but not all of them" Second: "Question about the Shin. Are the Shin originally from Roshar?" Answer: RAFO (First Card yay!) Third: "Tangentially related to that, does the Shin obsession/valuing of Stone/Metal have anything to do with Scadrial?" Answer: "Yes. Oathbringer gets you closer to finding out more about the Shin, but still a bit of a way out." Overall, I think that definitely opens a bit of a can of worms, but so glad I got to chat with him again. Also general pro-tip (I didn't see it specifically called out in the yes/no thing or missed it), keep questions and things in books to very specific things. He will not answer "Tell me who is a worldhopper" or anything that vague.

Sharders right now:

I've never posted here before, but I'm a regular reader of the forum. However, I have a theory that may be totally crazy and it isn't backed up by any evidence. Adolin does not appear to broken in the same way that most of the other Radiant's are. The guilt he suffered over Sadeas' murder doesn't seem to qualify as at the end of the book he makes it clear he felt he made the right decision. What if instead of him speaking the words of the Edgedancers, Mayalaran has to speak the words to be revived and create the Nahel bond? It is clear that Maya is regaining some semblance of consciousness and quite frankly I find the symmetry appealing. Also I factored in the fact that Adolin didn't have anything to do with Maya's initial death.

As we all know "There's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead." On the topic of dead spren didn't anyone find it weird that the spren's eyes were scratched out and when you kill someone with a shardblade their eyes burn? Is it the spren imitating what happens to humans in the physical realm o something else? Eyes are windows to the soul after all, so does that mean the line between a spren's spiritual realm is broken?

"I will not let those I can't save prevent me from saving those I can" was what I was thinking

A couple of years back, I posted a thread about how the names of the Unknown listed in Words of Radiance resembled a bunch of Mesopotamian gods. I'd like to start digging into the new Unmade names in Oathbringer. Previous thread: Other thread I wasn't in: In the meantime, a friend of mine asked Brandon about the Unmade names and Brandon said that he was inspired by real-world sources, but the sources didn't really have any influence on the Stormlight Archive plot. So this thread is just for fun inspiration digging. There aren't going to be any cool revelations about what will happen later in the series. Really. This is me being pedantic and academic. Anyways, I made a handy-dandy chart of the Unmade and which Mesopotamian gods I think Brandon got the names from: Unmade Nickname Powers Source? Yelig-Nar Blight Wind Consumes souls? ? Sja-anat Corrupts spren Satan (New Testament) or Anat, the Ugaritic and Egyptian goddess Nergaoul Causes the Thrill Nergal, the Mesopotamian god of death, pestilence and plague, and Lord of the Underworld Moelach Causes the Death Rattles Moloch, God of fire and chaos; child sacrifices Dai-gonarthis Black Fisher ? Dagan or Dagon, fisher or spear god Re-Shephir Midnight Mother Copycat murders Resheph, a Canaanite/Ugaritic god of plague; often equated to Nergal Ashertmarn Heart of the Revel Partying Ashera, Sumerian goddess and lady of the sea Bo-Ado-Mishram Commander of the unmade? Baal-Hadad? Seems a bit of a stretch. Chemoarish Dustmother ? Chemosh, Moabite god We previously attributed Re-Shephir to Resheph, Dai-gonarthis to Dagon (although he might not be an Unmade after all), Moelach to Moloch, and Nergaoul to Nergal. There's also been some debate over whether Sja-anat gets her name from Satan or Anat. Personally, I lean towards Anat. Anat was a goddess in both Egypt and Mesopotamian cultures, while Satan originates in the Old Testament and is never a Mesopotamian (or other nearby culture's) god. Of the new Unmade we learn about in Oathbringer, Chemoarish seems to pretty obviously take her name from the Moabite god Chemosh. The one wrinkle in that is Chemosh is a male god, while Chemoarish's sobriquet "Dustmother" implies she's a female spren. Ashertmarn is a bit more difficult. There's a goddess named Astarte/Astoreth, but I think it's Asherah, another goddess in the area. The "marn" part I have no idea about. Asherah is also called Asherah of the Sea, or Asheret Ya'am, and "mar" means "sea" in Spanish? I think that's a coincidence though. Bo-Ado-Mishram is a tough one. There's a god called Hadad who was also sometimes called Baal-Hadad (a conflation of two separate gods I think?). If you take a syllable from each name you get "Ba Ad", which is maybe a tiny bit similar? I think I'm on the wrong track with this one. Help! And as always, who the heck knows where Yelig-nar comes from. There's also the question of whether Brandon was taking inspiration from Judeo-Christian demons or Mesopotamian gods. Judeo-Christianity tends to label Mesopotamian gods as demons, hence the crossover. For example, Moloch, Dagon, Resheph, Asherah, and Nergal all get Old Testament mentions (I know very little New Testament stuff, so if anyone wants to chime in on that end that'd be great). This really comes into play over whether Sja-anat gets her name from Satan or Anat; the former is only possible if Brandon was going for demonology.

Despite his reluctance to fight, Rock killed Amaram. This, by normal right of conquest,means he has fulfilled his brothers quest to be the first Horneater with Shards, as he has claim to 2 blades and the Plate. Rock had stated before that the first Horneater to win Shards would become King of all the Clans. While I’m not sure if he can or will claim them; Rock may now be a King.

And dont forget that scene when she found out about Kaladin killing Helaran. Thats was a pretty strong burst out of the emotions that Shallan tried to suppress extremely hard and i believed it would be unleashed in equal way someday. BS then simply cut off that string and never bring up her emotions about it again. Instead we saw Shallan slowly bullying Kaladin, probably because of that. That makes me believe she will explode in the Book4 or 5 about that. Her initial reaction was too noticeable to just fade away and be dealt with. And i think Shallan isn't the one who will allow such things to fade away so simply. Also BS usually show how characters deal with their problems in the form of inner thoughts and reflection. He didn't show how Shallan went from burying her emotions to "well, whatever" state of mind. That makes me think we simply didn't see these thoughts yet.

"I can lash if I want to, I can leave your friends behind. Because your friends don't lash and if they don't lash then their no friends of mine." - Windrunners 4th Ideal

In which Nazh addresses all of us...

In the epilogue Hoid mentions that the man, to whom he entrusts the orphan girl, is named Cob. That is the name of Wax’s carriage driver

Adolin summoning Maya in under 10 heartbeats was one of the more surprising moments in the book for me. I had to read it a few times to really register it. I also noticed a striking similarity to Maya in Shadesmar and Ash scratching out her own eyes in all depictions of Herself. Not sure that’s relevant to anything, but I actually thought briefly that Maya was Ash in the Cognitive at the very beginning of that sequence, partly out of confusion since it was about 2 AM, and partly because of the scratched out eyes.

Deaths don't always happen when someone's life has reached a neat point where everything is just finished. Sometimes, people die just when they're about to do important things.

Hey everyone, it seems I'm officially apart of this crew. This proverbial "bridge crew". I'm a huge fan of Brandon Sanderson, and I've read every single cosmere book out there, pending on Oathbringer, which just barely arrived on my doorstep. Glad to be here and I hope together we can have a good time shouting about Hoid together. Now, I got to get back to reading Oathbringer...

I interpreted this: //"Burning. Overwhelming. Power. It as the scream of a thousand warriors on the battlefield. It was the moment of most sensual touch and ecstasy. It was the sorrow of loss, the joy of victory. And it was hatred. Deep, pulsing hatred with a pressure to turn all things molten. It was the heat of a thousand suns, it was the lives of all men wrapped up in one, defined by everything they felt."// As indicating "the burden of God's divine hatred"--in that it is everything that God "hates" and the anger shown in the hatred of it, so not just the emotion of hatred, but the embodiment of what God himself would proclaim to hate: selfishness, power, angry, murder, lust, emotion devoid of focus. All of this filtered through what Rayse himself hated--which is probably the idea of God himself and all who now embody portions of him/Adolnasium. It even seems like he's willing to give himself to others as the focus/object of their hate: "blame me--I did this" in order to channel that emotion into Odium's own power--a self-fulfilling cycle of hatred. Sustaining hatred at that level is too much. Which also, to me, would explain why Odium might have splintered off the more uncontrollable parts of god's hatred: gluttony/lust, passion for the kill, etc. They interfered with his ability to strategize. But I don't know about that. Those splinters now have their own separate intentions, which Odium obviously has no idea might act differently when divorced from his divine hatred.

Obviously, boots are well suited for running jokes.

I realized what one of the Willshaper oaths will be today I will go where no one has gone before.

I believe that's just where Glys likes to hide. Visual descriptions, after all, is how Jasnah confirmed the difference. When Glys forms into a Shardblade, he is most definitely not within Renarin's heart.

Not to sidetrack, but between Renarin and Venli, are we getting some foreshadowing for the idea that Honor and Odium aren't entirely incompatible?

Hoid's real goal: collect every iteration of Lightweaving in the cosmere.

Looking forward to it, Bleeder. As Argent said though, I don't think Lightspren are the Truthwatcher spren, despite the fact that they look like light. If it's a spren we've already seen, Mistspren seem to be a more likely candidate, but Brandon has said that he's not ready to canonize which spren the Truthwatchers have yet. Though I admit the expressions of Illumination tend to be a bit less well defined, I do think both the Adolin scene and the Thunderclast scene are Illumination. We've seen that illusions scare off some kinds of voidish entities from the way that Shallan fights them, and even though it's not a very nuanced used, I think that's what the light that Renarin uses is. Also I am fairly convinced that the Truthwatcher resonance has nothing to do with visions, but is actually an ability to see the truth of situations. Renarin early on seems to be aware of who really killed Sadeas. Stump says that she can always tell when the kids are lying to her and faking, and there's a quote from the in-world Words of Radiance that says: "their silence was not a sign of exceeding abundance of disdain, but rather an exceeding abundance of tact." Tact, because they know what's really happening but choose to politely not air everyone's dirty laundry for the sake of everyone getting along. I feel like I'm developing a little mini-theory that certain orders find certain Surges easier than others. Shallan picks up Illumination far faster than Transformation. Skybreakers learn Gravitation much faster than Division, to the point of being forbidden to use Division before their third oaths. Kaladin uses Adhesion naturally but isn't able to get Gravitation down until he sees the example from Szeth. Lift has Abrasion down pat, but has to be coached through using Progression by Wyndle, who also says that Regrowth would be too hard for her (though she later figures it out in a moment of desperation). And all three of the Truthwatchers we see use Regrowth easily, yet none of the three seem to dabble with Illumination very deeply on screen. Ym used his Progression intentionally but Stump healed unconsciously. I think the same is happening with Renarin, who finds Progression just easier than Illumination, but still has that surge and will be able to use it in time.

Rambling, not having read anything in shard, and kind of incoherent after 2 days in la la world. Dang, now its over. Can I mention the work of art that was Kaladin, Shallan and Adolin. Together they were just perfect, and complimented each other beautifully, one picking up the slack when another fell down. Adolin is a stunning character. I wish there had been more Nightblood VIVENNA. I was such an IDIOT I did not notice who she was until the dinner chat she had with Kaladin when they put the cards on the table. Ungh! Also, congratulations to Taravangian! After much, much work he finally managed to perform his goal of the Diagram superceding the Sons of Honor as the dumbest smart Secret Society in Roshar. Totally going to make a meme of this one. I felt quite bloodthirstily satisfied with the path Moash took. He irritated me on book 1. He annoyed me in book 2. And now this in book 3. There is a fierce satisfaction in knowing you had correctly judged a bad person even while everyone around them adored him. For a moment, Unity, I almost thought Dalinar had reassembled Honor ^^. Also, yes Dalinar was a monster, and yes Evi was a moron. Sneaking into a rival city when her husband was clearly firmly on the kill and not listen point, sigh. Elhokar made an amazing character recovery in OB. Then he died . And he was bonding a cryptic! AND JEZRIEN IS DEAD All Hail Queen Jasnah The Skybreakers are an interesting order. Although Nale is incomprehensible. "I have fought Odium actively for several thousand years. I have fought Odium more passively for 4000 years. So I'm now going to decide to side with him because I've decided his cronies deserve this land for no clear reason. Since its not as If I haven't known they were here before humans for the past 6000 years." The should use the spren more to spy, hope they investigate T in detail now. Who just hurried to spill something when he saw Szeth about to do it. CAN'T BELIEVE WE DIDNT SEE A CONVERSATION BETWEEN DALINAR AND SZETH. "You killed my brother" "Yes" "You tried to kill me. Actually were about 10 seconds away from it" "Yes" "Now you wan't to serve me ultimately" "Yes" "I need some valium" "Where should I get it?" Ash will be amazing to read Renarin was indeed bonded to a voidspren as suspected. Although not sure it counts as voidspren, is corrupted void? I called Dalinar was meant to be Odium's champion fairly early on Dalinar was touched by Cultivation herself, hmmm, poor Dalinar, with all 3 gods fighting over who gets more of him. Dalinar's powers were...wow. So many radiants and bridge 4 swearing ideals. Shallan and Adolin wedding. Maxal should be happy. Although I was kind of really shipping Kadolin halfway through. Alas Lift was awesome. I can see Edgedancers as the glue of all the orders. When the coalition fell appart it was amazing. "I'm concerned about what our ancestors did 7000 years ago, so I'm not going to fight as we descend from murderers." "I'm concerned the Alethi seek to conquer us in the next few years, so we will leave the coalition" Dudes...not to be the rain in your parade but the chances of you having a kingdom in a few years are small if you join together, and nil if you don't. So point is...? And if you are going to stop fighting because there are dishonorable people in your family tree then just don't get out of bed in the first place. Life before Death. The living over the dead. The present over the past. And harsh as it sounds, the descendants that own the world over the ancestors that once walked it. If anyone actually read all this messy chaos I wrote props to you. Going to have a nap then fully delve into 17th shard.

Some believe it's an accident, leftover from The Way of Kings Prime, where Taln had a different story arc (in which he wasn't sure who he is, if I recall correctly).

Because the rules don't apply to Kaladin Stormblessed, that's how.

I think that the epigraph for chapter 86 gives a clue: It sounded like something that Kaladin would struggle with as well, and he then went on to not being able to say it. That made me wonder if it isn't something like, "I will let people protect themselves, if they are able" or something like that. It seems like Kaladin has a hang up about needing to protect everyone, including members of Bridge Four who were in the midst of learning to protect themselves. To be honest, I'm not entirely sure that is right now that I finished the book, but it's what I thought when I read that epigraph.

I really liked the book, but the romance stuff felt off to me, and it took me a while to really chew on why. This is not the first, the second, or even the third time that Sanderson has done the exact same romantic plotline: boy meets girl, they enter into an arranged marriage, there are potential troubles in there, but in the end they both discover the arranged marriage unexpectedly works perfectly for them. In point of fact, we got the same thing from Laral in this book too, so that's TWICE that female characters have decided they actually like their situation IN ONE BOOK. The first time I read it, I thought it was a refreshingly different take than what you normally see in the media -- i.e. asking the question 'in societies where marriages are based on factors other than love, can you still make them positive relationships.' But at this point, the feminist in me is honestly starting to get deeply irritated with this weird idealization of arranged marriages. Once was interesting. This many times is really starting to bother me as a female reader. It takes me out of immersion because I have such a distasteful knee-jerk backlash to it that colours the way I feel about all characters involved, no matter how much I otherwise like them as characters. I don't know if that makes sense, or even if it's a feeling that extends to other readers at all (I might well be unique and everyone else has zero problems with this).

Things that made me confused or irritated in OB about Adolin, Shallan and Kaladin. 1)BS only once mentioned Adolin noticing how Shallan looked at Kaladin, in the end of the Part 4. Then he brought that "i saw you looking at each other all the time" arguement. Id prefer BS to build up this arguement better, cause it looks like brought it as a fast made up point for Adolin to wish to broke up with Shallan. 2)Repeating of the same back and forth. I swear someday ill put the whole OB into MSWord and use the search of "his blue eyes", "handsome" and "dangerous eyes" objects. I bet i fill find alot of the scene where Shallan said this stuff. The same with Kaladin. How many times he told himself "Im not going to be with her"? At least three times. damnation, that some delightfull masochism. 3)For some reason since the Part 2 or Part 3 of OB BS for some reason started to heavily imply that its Veil who liked Kaladin, parallelly baiting us with Shallan showing the hints of interest in him too. Thats confusing and irritating. 4)They dont talk each other. BS wave away Adolin murder like nothing, as well as make Kaladin to not be bothered with telling to Shallan about Helaran, and make Shallan be absolutely fine with Helaran death. Well, given how she bullied Kaladin, she is not fine but dont bother to explain to Kaladin why she does this. Thats pretty egoistic behaviour id say. 5)The whole solution. That was pretty painfull. BS did everything to show that both Adolin and Shallan ruin their relationship in that scene showing all their issues yet decided to hook up nevertheless basically saying "Lets Ignore It". Also "I really love him" thing. Well, i dont get the "real thing" vibe from that. There was no proper build up and it just didnt work for me. 6)Yet BS continued teasing us untill the very end bringing Shallan staring at Kaladin hovering above the roof even during Shallan-Adolin conversation. He could have avoid it but no.

liieeesss Taln is pure and beautiful

These are all good guesses, and likely very close to the truth but I worry that they sound rather callous. I agree that from a logical and efficiency standpoint Kaladin would be more effective if he "grew calluses" like his father recommends, but at the same time the fact that he cares so much for his people and the lost is his best leadership attribute. I would say in the real world there is no better characteristic to have in a leader/mentor, than to know that they truly care about you and your well-being. Perhaps it will be something like "I will honor the fallen" (in contrast to just mourning the fallen) or even just a re-phrasing of "I will place the lives of others before death, their journies before their destinations". I think this hits at a very important theme with Kaladin. Almost all of his "failures" as he sees them, were actually successes. Sure, he has seen the death of many under his protection, but almost all of them died with more purpose/hope/happiness than if he had not been protecting them. It was an end, but a better end. Tien knew his brother was there, his soldiers in Amaram's army felt hope and purpose in a pointless war, his bridgemen felt more alive than ever in a hopeless situation, Elkohar finally felt like a hero etc. Even Syl says she first sought Kaladin out because of how he made the soldiers under his command feel. Sizgil makes similar statements in WOK, at first he hated Kaladin for giving Bridge 4 false hopes of survival, but in time came to accept that even if Kaladin couldn't save Bridge 4 he was like a surgeon easing their suffering. I don't want Kaladin to stop caring, but him being able to see the effects of what he's doing on people's quality of life beyond just lived/died seems the most important revelation he can have.

I was pretty worried about the multiple personality disorder thing. the execution works all right in the sense that it's nothing like the disorder and it's clearly related to her magic. I don't like it, I think it'll require more work to be done right, but when they almost cast Renarin as the Villain I did almost put the book down and stop. Between those things I was nearly done. As for everyone calling Adolin and Shallan boring, I hope your in world relationships are like theirs. Relationships full of temper and insults aren't healthy. Kaladin has a lot of learning to do before he'll make anybody happy.

I love the book. I suffered from serious sleep deprivation while reading it, there is just no place where you can stop reading properly. Dalinar ascending was definitely impressive, most touching for me was "The Girl who Stood Up" though. Hoid and Shallan together retelling the story was just beautiful. In his youth, Hoid promised to be there where he is needed. Although he himself thinks in the end he was in Kholinar to pick up the Patternspren (I guess it's the spren Elhokar was cut off bonding), I think him giving Shallan a view how to deal with her past is the true need to be in Kholinar. Reading that chapter, I had tears in my eyes. The secret that caused the Recreance was a bit underwhelming for me. That humans are the invaders on Roshar was clear to me beforehand. Nonetheless I see the problems it would have caused for the KR of old. Odium not being only the God of Hatred but of all Passions. I am not sure whether he lied there or not. Be it as it may, I have got the impression that the Thaylen "Passions"-superstition is a remnant of old Odium worship. Renarin has bonded a Sja-Anat spren. Seeing the future is in fact of Odium, but I don't see Renarin as an evil guy. The lines blur between good and evil. Sja-Anat wants to change sides - as she says herself and the Ghostbloods also assume. The letter "E" seems to be Oathbringers Redshirt. Eshonai, Elhokar, Eth dead. For Eshonai I was sad. Elhokar died just when I started to like him a bit better, well Eth was not such an important member of Bridge 4, now he can join his brother who died in WoR. RIP. Moash. What a jerk. And now equipped with a mysterious blade, enabling him to kill the Heralds for good. The Oathpact is in true danger now. When will we get book 4? There we come to the great flaw of Oathbringer. It is too short! I could continue reading forever, I guess.

So we got confirmation that humans came to Roshar because of a major disaster on their "original" world and that the big secret was that they had destroyed their own planet with surgebinding. This is interesting and has many implications, it will probably take a while to shift through all of them (the book has been out for like 2 days at the time of writing this post haha) but I would like to discuss two theories I had just considering the basics within the context of the Cosmere as we know it. 1. The "Tranquiline Halls" is Ashyn So with the confirmation in text that humans are not native to Roshar, something that has been more or less confirmed through various WoBs over the years so isn't groundbreaking news, we start to wonder where they came from. We know that they arrived as refugees fleeing the devastation of their original home, so the initial group must have come from the same world. I posit that that world is Ashyn, the planet right next to Roshar that we know is a blasted wasteland save a few pockets where humans survive. And that it got that way because as Khriss mentions in her essay on Greater Roshar in AU: it "suffered a cataclysm long ago". It makes logistical sense, a massive number of refuges that would be produced by a global disaster would most likely want to settle in the place that was both safe and as close as possible to limit how long they were displaced. Even with the distance warping of the Cognitive why trek halfway across the galaxy with probably nothing but the clothes on your back when you can find shelter the next planet over? Then there is this Death Rattle from WoK that most people have, again, guessed for years refers in someway to the humans initially displacing the native Parsh: The last sentence is of specific import in this case. The place that is "hollow and forlorn" might refer the Braize, where the cognitive shadows of the genocided Dawnsingers that would later become the Fused were locked up. But the part where the speaker (presumably a human "Voidbringer") claiming that they themselves once burned is probably a reference to the disaster that destroyed their homeworld. And guess what? Back in that essay in Arcanum Unbound Khriss names Ashlyn "the burning planet". Other possibilities for the identity of the Tranquiline Halls would be either 1) Yolen or 2) a yet unnamed planet. I find Yolen unlikely because the chronology seems to indicate a big time lapse before whatever happened to Yolen (assuming it happened in close proximity to the Shattering and the Birth of the 16) and the human refugees showing up with Odium as their god. For one we know he was off chasing Ambition in the space around Therody, and also took time to go murder the Selish shards. Assuming the conflict between Odium and Honor started soon after his arrival in Roshar and hasn't abated since he would have taken an unbelievably short time to accomplish his prior goals. Not to mention that whatever happened to Yolen had nothing to do with surgebinding, but that is not that big of a deal breaker as I will explain shortly. As for a yet unknown world? Well I can't find evidence for or against something we don't know exists now can I? So we should really have someone ask Brandon if the Tranquiline Halls are a world we already know about during the OB tour. 2. The Tranquilline Halls were destroyed, but probably not by surgebinding as we know it So this being the big secret behind the Recreance confused me. I understand how the characters in universe might come to this conclusion but it makes little sense for the Cosmerically aware. Obviously something big *did* happen to the homeland of the humans to make them refugees and this being the Cosmere that thing most likely related to usage of Investiture. But we know that, while a magic user can use their magic anywhere given the right resources, initiation into a magic system requires Connection to a certain Shard and/or a certain planet. As surgebinding as we understand it is a system created by bonding a spren of Honor/Cultivation that has learned to mimic the blades Honor forged from his own soul to give the heralds. And he gave those blades to the heralds to enforce the oathpact. So as we know that H+C came to Roshar before Odium and now know that Odium came with the human refugees. It seems incongruous to believe that surgebinders in the mold of the KR existed and destroyed the Tranquiline Halls BEFORE the humans came to Roshar with Odium, who started a fight with Honor, who then forged an Oathpact with 10 humans, which splinters of H+C's power then copied to create surgebinders. Furthermore in WoR Honor in the visions tells Dalinar he "didn't foresee the coming of the Knights" and confirms Syl's comments about the spren mimicking the Honorblades to produce the surges. But if surgebinders already existed and were the reason the Tranquiline Halls were destroyed, why would the coming of surgbinders surprise Honor? But what if surgebinding existed in a different form and Honor was just surprised to see the spren recreate it? Well then I maintain that you can't assume spren-based surgbinding will have the same result (planetary devastation) as whatever was used back home. Its like Hoid's Lightweaving vrs. Shallan's. Even if the effects are similar or even identical, the mechanics are markedly different. And we haven't considered the Dawnshards which in OB Honor claimed destroyed the Tranquilline Halls as he was in his death throes. So whatever wrecked the homeland of Roshar's humans was not surgbinding (again at least not as we know it) and so the truth behind the Recrence seems to be a tragic misunderstanding by the people involved possibly conflating two different magic systems from two different planets, probably.

Just a wild unrelated thought. Ever since we learned Odium is passion, I couldn't help but cringe at Shallan's remarks about Kaladin. It's like he would make a pretty good influence target or alternative vessel for the shard.

There is a difference between accepting the sacrifice others make (and their choice inherent in that), triage (accepting your limits, the Serendipity) and what Amaram does which is placing the destination ahead of the journey and sacrificing others to get there. Kal doesn't understand this yet. Amaram never could, and uses that misunderstanding to throw accusations of "not so different" at Dalinar, but he is wrong. The same is true when people compare Jasnah's cold prioritisation to Amaram's selfish sacrifice of others to further his ends. Jasnah's approach is another version of the Journey, a moral path, almost anathema to Kaladin's but consistent and logical and there. Amaram's lacks any morality and as Kal reminds him in their final battle, he himself knows it even if he can't accept it.

As to the powers of the Fused coming from the Unmade, I disagree. I thought that Part 2 made pretty clear that the Fused's powers come from Parshendi spirits having, for lack of a better word, marinaded in Odium's essence, taking on some of his magic through the damage caused to their personalities by the (sometimes repeated) death of their bodies, and that the forms of power seem to let them access at least one surge at a time. (I suspect they can only access one) A little cleanup on Renarin, too. I would also note very carefully in the second scene of Chapter 122 where Odium talks to Taravangian that Renarin's name on the Diagram is hidden from Odium's vision. This is likely due to a similar effect to Ruin's blindness to metal. edit: here's the exact quote: I'm not 100% convinced that Glys is a corrupted spren. That might be true, and seems like the most obvious reading of the text, and that Ivory's comments ("a traitor is", iirc?) may simply refer to corruption of a Lightspren by Sja-anat, but it could also be that Glys is some other type of spren typically associated with Odium that has switched sides. (I think we can safely assume they're not talking about Sja-anat herself with that comment given the context of Jasnah running off to find Renarin) Whichever exact interpretation is correct, I also find it very likely that Renarin has no access to Lightweaving at all, and that his visions of the future are probably a manifestation of a different Surge that's replaced lightweaving. We'll have to wait and see if any other Lightspren choose humans to have a point of comparison.

Agreed. She actively pushed the thought away so I'm pretty sure this hasn't been addressed yet. The arrival of her 3 other brothers will likely result in her addressing this issue more now because they will be constant reminders, and anyway it seems likely Helaran will be brought up at some point. That aside, Mraize sent her a letter with tidbits of details about Helaran which she should follow-up on, not-the-least because if she genuinely wants to understand the political scheming that is going on behind the scenes (Ghostbloods, Sons of Honour, Diagramists) she needs to get in with at least one of these groups. This will definitely cause her to have to confront Helaran's life choices, and thus his death, at some point. My guess, she isn't going to like some of those revelations. As a quick side note, do we know when she finds out in relation to her having trouble with identifying who she really is? Could this suppression actually be the trigger for her descending into her dissociative state? She didnt seem to be in one in WoR? (DID brief synopsis of diagnostic criteria from DSM-5: https://www.healthyplace.com/abuse/dissociative-identity-disorder/dissociative-identity-disorder-did-dsm-5-criteria/) I suspect there is a trigger, perhaps a small one. I'm already halfway through my second readthrough so I've missed it if indeed it is there. I'll look through on my third, but if someone has evidence one way or the other I'd be most grateful.

I'm inclined to say that it does have to do with triaging. If we accept that the windspren start showing up around Kaladin when he's getting close to the Fourth Ideal - The Second and Third Ideals are very inclusive - protecting those that can't protect themselves, and protecting everyone despite his dislike for them. However, this inclusiveness leads Kaladin to start questioning the potential conflicts of Ideals starting in WoR, and it comes to a head during the Kholinar Oathgate scene: And this results in everyone Kaladin was trying to protect here dying - in trying to save them all, he saves none of them. It's interesting to note that Kaladin seems to make an assumption that he has to kill people to protect here; I'm not sure if this is Kaladin's mistake or the writing, but he doesn't seem to consider potentially non-lethal solutions, e.g. lashings. Of course it probably would be a very short term solution if he couldn't get people to disengage, and he probably still wouldn't have been able to save everyone. It might also be representative that protecting people non-lethally is probably easier if you have Shardplate instead of just a Shardblade. So the Fourth Ideal is probably some kind of priority or exception handling so the Windrunner doesn't blue screen (so to speak) as Kaladin does here. That said, I think there are probably multiple variants that the Oaths will accept. We know that there's a lot of leeway in how the Oaths can be interpreted and accepted (even from the Skybreakers, who likely have the most stringent requirements on their Oaths), and among other things we see Dalinar apparently make up his own (while this is probably somewhat related to his powers as a Bondsmith, the Stormfather is surprised by Dalinar's Oath and what it lets him do - presumably the Stormfather already knows what a Bondsmith should be able to do). So it may be that Kaladin won't be able to accept the 'canon' version of the Oath and find a different way to do his triaging. The Oathgate scene shows that Kaladin has to find some kind of solution, even if it's not the seemingly callous solution the old Windrunners apparently ended up with. It's worth noting that the optimal solution to the problem with the Fused (though perhaps not Odium in general) is probably not to restore the Oathpact, but to convince the parshmen stop sacrificing themselves to them. Everyone is worried about the ability of the Fused to return, not realizing or knowing that they need willing volunteers to do so. I don't think simply choosing a side is the ultimate 'right' answer for Kaladin, even if he does need a way to make choices when necessary. Instead, I think his job will be to find a third option.

Another curious thing about Glys is that he resides in Renarin's heart: It reminded me of the gemhearts of the parsh, where spren are trapped to apply their forms. Glys is not trapped in Renarin, he can come out at will. His chosen home, though, is Renarin's heart. The other Radiantspren we have seen are all external. Except: Venli's spren in the end sits in her gemheart and has the voidspren captured.

I was actually really not a fan of the potential that "triangle" had to lead to super stupid decisions and conflict in that trio... but I really liked the way it resolved. It resolved in a way that involved Shallan making a choice, realizing that Adolin understood -- and where he didn't understand, he accepted. That's something that Shallan has always needed, is someone who understands where possible, acknowledges that it's not always possible, and accepts her as she is. He's encouraging, but doesn't feel the need to try to "fix" everything for her, which would be a major problem from her perspective. The way it turned out made the whole thing a point of growth for all three; in short, I felt it was actually healthy, which is the exact opposite of about every other "love triangle" you see in fiction (and the reason I usually hate them).

The way you said that made me think "STOP KILL STEALING" in a video game. Hehe. Shallan really needs a hug. And the person who gives it to her is... Hoid? I was so confused by that, like I kept texting my friends "HE'S BEIGN NICE? WHY IS HE BEING NICE?" Also Cyrptid bounding time! I love that chapter ending. What happened with Hoid and Jasnah's encounter at the end of the last book? We might get deets on that in the future. I love my new baby pattern. And Hoid now being a rosharian lightweaver too? That mgiht be a reason for him spending time around Shallan, to get some info on the order. I loved the other honorspren's reactions to Sylphrena. I just lost it in giggles at the "It's me, the Ancient Daughter! Oh, I sure am feeling particularily capricious!" I mean I was just flat out GIGGLING FOR TEN WHOLE MINUTES hahaha. Jasnah: The only woman with the ability to make a room full of scholars weep at her pure LOGIC BOMB. Like. Can I get her to write my essays? Also I love the interlude girl with the romance novel. LIFT AND SZETH AND NIGHTBLOOD (Almost said Nighthound. Nighthound being a sword with the command to destroy evil would be... interesting. Not sure how he'd be able to destroy evil when he is evil) LIFT IN GENERAL. SHE HAS A STICK. EVI. POOR EVI. I LOVE HER. POOR GIRL. Honestly total coincidence my nanowrimo story has a character named Eve and I was like... uh... And I mean DALINAR, DALINAR CALM DOWN. YOU DON'T NEED TO SET IT ON FIRE. I MEAN OKAY I SAY KILL IT WITH FIRE BUT I DON'T REALLY MEAN IT? LIKE? SERIOUSLY? CHILL? NIGHTWATCHER AND CULTIVATION (more reactions to come)

I'd argue that not being able to say the words is actually very important in his character arc right now. Also, we know from the Szeth scenes that, for some people, it will take many years to progress through the Ideals all the way, if they even do so.