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Pulled an Ene! Woo hoo, 14,000!

I'll just go ahead and start with the TL;DR explanation. Below I go through a somewhat lengthy explanation of a theory that Honor may have somehow claimed all Rosharan humans as his representatives and delegated to them, collectively, authority over Odium's binding to the Rosharan system. This protects the humans from direct attacks of Odium by virtue of the Shards' non-interference pact. And I posit that Odium created the Unmade specifically to drive Honor out of the hearts of men and thereby cause them to give up that protection. We start in RoW 99, where Wit and Jasnah have the following exchange about the contract they plan to present to Odium for the contest of champions: Super juicy stuff. There are different ways we could interpret Wit's line about the promise Rayse made by taking up the Shard of Odium. It could be that, because the others of the 16 knew that Odium was the most dangerous, they required a specific promise from Rayse. It could be that they all made a promise that they would hold to later promises or contracts that they make once they have taken up the Shards. But I think that the most straightforward and most likely meaning, given the context, is that this is a reference to the agreement among the Shards that they were not to interfere with one another. Here's Edgli (Endowment) talking about the agreement in her letter to Hoid from the OB epigraphs: I'll note here, that for some time I was under the - I now think mistaken - impression that the agreement among the Shards (to the extent there was one) was that they would no co-locate. But Edgli says here that the agreement was that they would not "interfere with one another." In light of that, the reference to two Shards settling in one location seems to be her saying that she thinks if two Shards do that, they will inevitably interfere with one another. (Side note: This could also explain why - separate and apart from what Brandon has said about the Shards' agreement not rising to the level of an oath - Honor didn't view himself as violating any agreement by going to Roshar with Cultivation. Maybe he simply believed that he and Cultivation worked together and did not interfere with one another.) Which brings us back to how making Wit a contractual liaison of Honor affords him protection. It's because it makes him a representative or agent of Dalinar, and by extension, Honor. And Wit says that will protect him from direct attacks from Odium. This suggests that the Shards' agreement not to interfere with one another extends to representatives or agents of the Shards. If a Shard directly attacks such a representative, they violate the non-interference pact and open themselves up to an attack from the other Shards. It's worth noting here, that after Jasnah asks Wit who he really is, Wit responds that he's someone who turned down the offer of a Shard and who is therefore "not bound." There's at least a hint in RoW that the reason Rayse hates Wit so much is because Wit is not subject to the non-interference pact and has been going around messing with Rayse's plans over the years: The flip side of Wit not being associated with a Shard, however, would be that he would not be covered by the protections of the non-interference pact. That would explain why Wit has always been so cautious to hide from Shards. By virtue of the line added to the contract, however, Wit now gains the protection. (with this protection in place, maybe in MB era 2 Wit will accede to Harmony's request that he come out of the shadows) Wit seems to have explained to Dalinar that he falls under the protection of the pact. Here's Dalinar thinking to himself to stay calm when Rayse gets mad during their contract negotiations in RoW 112: That last line there is interesting. It seems Wit had explained to Dalinar that Rayse couldn't attack him. But Wit didn't explain the part about it possibly leading to Rayse's death. Dalinar seems to have figured that out from the earlier part of his conversation with Rayse where he asked what would happen if Rayse broke their contract: I'm also intrigued here by the line about Honor doing something to prevent Odium from using his powers on most individuals. The Stormfather told us in OB that Honor loved humankind and died defending them. And back in WoR 82, the Stormfather said this: I think that line about the winds men must feel could mean that the Stormfather has to bring the highstorms regularly to keep reminding men of Honor; maybe even to touch a part of them that is attuned to Honor. I've been kicking around a theory that Honor somehow delegated down and dispersed to the humans of Roshar, collectively, the power to release Odium from his bonds, thereby making humans representatives of Honor whom Odium could not then directly attack. Maybe this collective delegation is why Unity is so important. And maybe this is what all of the talk about Honor living on in the hearts of men is about, and why Wit seems to believe that the real contest will be about the hearts of men and women. Here's he and Jasnah again in RoW 99: I think this idea also fits in with how Odium uses the Unmade, as a way to try to corrupt the hearts of men. He can't attack people directly, so he sends the Unmade to sow discord and division and drive Honor out of the hearts of men. This WoB seems to be more about how Odium wasn't involved in the creation of the humans on Roshar, and therefore can't exploit the cracks in their souls the same way Ruin could on Scadrial where he had a hand in creating the humans. But it also suggests that Odium uses the Unmade to try to accomplish the same types of things. He's not attacking, just twisting their motivations and desires: It's also interesting to note here that common-form Singers appear to have a natural defense against having cracks in their soul exploited. Presumably this is because the spren that they bond in order to take on their forms fill in those cracks. At any rate, this makes me think that the Unmade were crafted specifically for the purpose of corrupting the hearts of men. As we know, Odium simply destroying or subjugating the humans of Roshar will not release him from his bonds. If Honor did, as I've theorized, disperse the authority to free Odium to the humans of Roshar, then it makes sense that Odium would try to drive as many people as possible to turn away from Honor, and thereby remove the protections afforded by being representatives of Honor. This brings me to one more reference to the protections afforded to most humans on Roshar. It appears in the last Taravangian Interlude (I-12) before the climax of the book. Sja-Anat has come to speak with Taravangian and offered to assist him in drawing Odium's attention, and then closes with this warning: What if the purpose of the Unmade is to drive as many humans as possible to make choices or deals that exempt them from the protection of being representatives of Honor? Maybe if Odium can pull enough of them (it would have to be a lot, I think) outside of that protection and then exert direct influence on them he can convince them to release him? I'm interested as always to hear others' thoughts. [Edit] I had two additional thoughts to add. One is about how pleased Odium was with the size of the coalition that Dalinar had gathered for the Battle of Thaylen Field, and correspondingly how devastated he was when Dalinar didn't turn to Odium. If Odium was trying to turn as many hearts of men against Honor as possible, imagine the effect of Dalinar putting together this grand coalition in the name of Honor and Unity, and then turning and agreeing to be Odium's champion. Oof. That's like a kill shot. The second concerns Ruin and Preservation. If the pact the Shards made was about not interfering with one another, it was probably smart of them to make what seemed like a formal agreement outlining how they were going to cooperate to create Scadrial. Might have saved them from an accusation that they violated the pact.

I finally decided to make use of those annoying advertisements Minor Way of Kings

A few possible answers. One, he is just personifying them and feels like he can, and there is nothing overtly special going on. He is the type to do that. Another explanation could be the whole 'child of tanavast' thing. And lastly, the it could be that all pieces of wood are sentient and the spears kaladin have wielded are the only chance for peace between Humans and wood now that Shallan insulted the great Stick, who is now rallying the other woods to war!

I'm stealing Kindness's thing shh AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

OB

Continuing on the topic of jest:

Because of numerous factors, my school day ends at 11:45 am. 3 hour school day. Pog.

Honestly, later revelations aside, those med schools are both impressive and great for society. I'm actually pretty sure that, as far as we know, they represent the only secular institutionalized higher education on the planet.

a thousand years battlehardened immortal being getting scared of a glowing mental patient. not a fan

Week 12 Poem #12 It's been some time, but here is the next one. Taurus's Tale What is my crime than I have been trapped? Is the curse of my birth a reason to lock me away in an inescapable abyss? My father you have cursed me and damned me to be anathema in the eyes of the whole cosmos. I seek to live and yet I am your weapon. Flesh I did not seek and yet now I can die or consume lifeblood. Poeseidon you petty tyrant! Yours is the hand that made a sacrifice of me and so many others in the place of that which was not yours. The walls of my prison echo with the animalistic cries of those whom I must kill for an eternity of eternities. These terrible screams envelop me so utterly that I cannot ever forget them. Each one is so distinct and awful that I am filled with rage and despair everlasting. None can truly hear the way that I rage against the evil that exists in this world. If only my horns could pierce the skies and gore the so called deities who stay silent while the chorus of death fills my ears with horror that will never leave me alone. How can I rest when these voices clamor for me to stop? Can I rest while this abomination shackles me to suffering that I have been compelled to bear. Tell me of your desire master of the seas so that I may spit upon it. One sacrifice for another have you taken. New oceans now flow for your amusement. Scarlet rivers be your wine and the final gasps be the nightmares that invade your stupor. A day will come when justice will avenge those who have none to stand for them. No more singing will ring out from this dungeon at the door to Tartarus. Minos, father of slaughter, hubris buried me alive. As the three weave, measure, and cut you will know the wrath wrought by the wronged. While I am called monster Hades will punish those who have woven their deceit. Names and words wield power. Though I have none of these, truths will not forever hide. Steps come. Thrace fills my nostrils. There is a blade in the dark.

She stole the bond from Rlain...

OB

Some Yogi Berra-isms: "Ninety percent of this goat is half mental." "When you come to a goat in the road, take it!" "You can observe a goat just by watching." "A goat ain't worth a dime anymore."

-Quality Over Quantity: On Wayne, the new hit single by rap superstar Da King's Wit. Clearly, he's feeling ambitious today. We'll see how it goes.

And may or may not be doing so for gaining knowledge about the coming devastation and travesty of the future. Just say'n

That option would make no sense (provided you mean an avatar of Autonomy). If that were the case he'd know the mechanics of Sandmastery and would have no reason to send an observer with Khrissalla.

*deep breath* AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH I'm fine.

You're welcome.

Why won't the 'x' work on the ad?

Interesting question. Would that destroy their Physical or Spiritual (& Physical, because if you destroy the Spiritual, that'll reverberate down to the other realms from what we know of Dragonsteel)? If it doesn't destroy the objects in the Physical Realm, only their Cognitive aspects or "minds", what effect would that have on the objects? What would happen to the people, would their flames be affected? Would they turn mindless? What would be the effect of an irradiated Cognitive Realm? Keeping in mind that the Cognitive Realm does have Physical materials, people can breathe there: https://wob.coppermind.net/events/332/#e9512) What happens to the Investiture, how does it react?

Well also note that Marasi moved like a whole, what, 50 feet while moving hypersonic+ for her brief half-second, right? I don't think that's enough air to get super hot via compression, so Marasi's case probably can't really be used anyway? EDIT: The real problem is that the more we argue about these kinds of details and semantics, the more clear the system inconsistencies get and the less reliable WoBs and books become. What's eventually going to happen is that our modernist philosophy concerning Realmatics is going to break down, causing philosophical chaos in our society as we completely lose faith in concepts like reality and objective truth. All will Tremble in the Night of Sorrows, the True Desolation...

I just remembered April is autism awareness month! So... Happy autism awareness month! Next month is mental health awareness month, and for the past few years I have been doing a post on May 1st about that, so I'll also post an update when I get that up.

After Ialai is killed

No but in retrospective we should have

I am rather disappointed no seems to have noticed the joke... In other news: did any one expect corrupted cryptics to be imaginary numbers?

I was just rereading WoK, and I found this in the middle, when Shallan is trying to soulcast for the first time: "However, she’d found a book the day before that had offered what seemed like a useful tip. It claimed that humming, of all things, could make a Soulcasting more effective." Did anybody catch this at the time, or did it go over all of our heads?

I finally get to be in the fan side of the meme! EDIT: I also get to be the top in a Ninja!

Here are a set of axehound breeds I drew, let me know what you think. I have a few headcanons about these if you want to learn more about them just ask me which one.

That last option may have some teeth to it considering most wood on Roshar are soulcast, that soul casting proccess might make the "soul" of the object touch the physical realm just like the inverse of lift touching the cognitive realm. But Stick might be unrelated as he has transceded both mortal and immortal offences. He is a Stick.

I’m an Elsecaller! I find it curious that other people got negative answers - my lowest was Dustbringer, but that was still over 30 percent.

When Vasher pulled Nightblood's long lost twin out of Whimsy's Perpendicularity, I lost it.

Slowly Catching Up on Critiques: Pg 3, "She’d missed finding her people by days." My heart hurts. Pg 4, "We can access just enough to be dangerous." I am assuming you mean that the knowledge is dangerous, not S and Co. Pg 4, "HAS MANY PENDING MESSAGES FROM ME." At's voicemail: Pg 5, " I think it needs those trees to reproduce." Makes seeds? Like a coconut it unleashes into the ocean of space? Pg 6, "But that would break at least seventeen laws of ph-" Like Ard ever cared. Pg 9, "intestines ripped apart by migrating cellulose." I know they are going to survive because book but I am stressed none the less. Pg 9, " it had to come out, right?" As a new baby planet, right? Pg 12, " swallow them in darkness." Ugh, I hate cliffhangers!!! Tense chapter. I kept waiting, waiting, waiting for S to just snap have a breakthrough and...nope! Not yet! Like, I should have logically known she wasn't that far enough character development wise, that it was too early, but I kinda forgot while reading. I just wanted to know what was happening. I had to reread the exposition about the cellulose a couple of times, but that's pretty typical of me trying to follow heavy worldbuilding logic in any book. The important part for me was that I came out the other side understanding.

Dunno who's gonna see this but hello!

So I have a few that I can think of right now (spoilers for Mistborn era 1, Words of Radience Oathbringer and part 1 of Rhythm of War.) Forgot to say what was my favorite book : it is Words of Radience ! So amazing !

Why is Kal Obama?

This is why George Washington won the American Revolution. He wasn't a brilliant strategist or tactician, winning battles by miraculous planning or zealous passion. His greatest skill was knowing when to cut your losses and withdraw, because past a certain point, it's more important to preserve your forces than continue fighting. And that's also been a big problem Kaladin struggles with: when to stop fighting and just let himself rest and heal. Another option could be "I will accept the role of leadership", as Kal has many times felt uncomfortable with the notoriety and people looking up to him, and an essential part of being an effective military leader is to accept that you will lose people, which is what the 4th Ideal was about.

This is very interesting, especially the part about Sja-anat seeming like two entities sharing a mind. Theory: The number of names of an Unmade shows in how many realms they actively exist. I.e. Unmade with no hyphen exist mainly in Physical Realm, Unmade with one hyphen have active parts in both Physical and Cognitive, and BAM also has active part in Spiritual (potentially explaining how she was able to manipulate connections). This might tie together with theory that there were originally 16 such sprenand what Odium did is that he tied some together, and showed them into Cognitive realm and in one case even into Spiritual realm (we know Odium can take things out of spiritual into cognitive, so why not take something from cognitive and put it in spiritual?)

Yes, the example you mention is in the other WoB I have shared, one I based my calculations on. The issue is that you still ignore the other WoB, the one I shared as well (https://wob.coppermind.net/events/153/#e2803) which directly state that the loss when tapping large amounts of attribute does not depend on rate of storage. Here is the WoB See? The compounder could not overcome the loss when tapping large amounts, they run into the same limitation as the normal Feruchemist, hence I would expect my analysis to roughly hold. The advantage compounders have is only in the size of their stores, they still suffer from losses at the same rate as any other Feruchemist. So if air resistance could kill you (also this WoB, https://wob.coppermind.net/events/93/#e2695), they cannot move much faster than Mach 2, as at that point the air resistance would heat them up to ~120 Celsius quite quickly, in practice they would be limited to Mach 1.5 maybe. So they would definitely not reach your examples of Mach 280. Example of Marasi complicated this a bit, but she was moving at Mach ~7 only for about ~0.5 second at best, so not enough time to heat up. I do not understand what you meant by the comment about metalmind being good but incomplete. Sidenote: You can put citations from Arcanum into quotes, it makes it more readable. @The Technovore already answered this (thank you for that), and included links for Rosharan's being on others planet some thing I was not aware off. I will add my own thoughts. On if Roshar will travel before Scadrial, um I would expect so. Anyone who is not Radiant can already travel outside of Rosharan system, they just need to either convince Coalition to send them to Shadesmar, or find Cultivations' perpendicularity and cross over. Then it is mostly question of walking. If Radiants will do it any time soon, well that is a bigger question. However, based on WoBs it seems it is an issue of spren's connection to Roshar and since we now have unchained Bondsmiths for whom modifying Connections is as easy as reaching out, I do not think we will have to wait long. Ultimately, Roshar has the means to enable mass off-world travel already, even for Radiants, they just need to put the pieces together. Conversely Scadrial does not yet have the needed technology yet, their ships and occupants of those ships would not yet be able to travel outside the atmosphere, let alone a solar system, and developing that material science will take at least a century for them, possibly more. I think this is wrong and actually provably so. If it worked as you say, than any time Full Feruchemist would store their Identity enough, all their previous stores would become unkeyed metalminds, even the aluminum-mind with their Identity. However, unkeyed metalminds are unknown to Northern Scadrians, despite Terris actively experimenting with spiritual metals. In principle all it would take to discover unkeyed metalminds is to have two aluminum ferrings and experiment with both at once, and since they are already thinking along these directions they would most likely ask them to switch metalminds after filling them and then they would notice that both of those metalminds became unkeyed (if it worked as you say, that Identity-lock in metalmind is being updated), yet they only theorize about such happening. This clearly implies that such things are not happening. In addition, all the process for creating unkeyed metalminds mention that you need to store Identity first, and only then you can create unkeyed metalminds, something your thesis contradicts. EDIT: The best counterargument, and I did not think of it first. If it worked as you say it does (connection to metalmind updates Identity-lock) unkeyed metalminds could not exist at all. Any time someone would created one, the second they stopped storing Identity, the metalmind would revert to a keyed one, i.e. it would no longer be 'unkeyed metalmind' and so unkeyed metalminds could not exist as they do in-world. In light of the above, I do not think your thesis holds, i.e. I do not think Identity-lock on metalminds is actively being updated.

Ok, how was I supposed to know that Renarin was hinted at being made of gold in WoR, I still don't know where everyone else got that from.

I rather agree with you, here. I obviously don't want to make is appear as if I'm "bored" with Kaladin's mental illness or anything, and I realize that his representation of depression is really meaningful to a lot of people. But I also feel like Sanderson laid it on a bit thick with this book. It's like he has a list of "Bad Things I Haven't Done to Kaladin Yet" and he's just going through it one by one. Struggling with depression and survivor's guilt? I'm on board with that. It's made him a really interesting character. But when you go on to say "oh and then your old best friend tells you to commit suicide and your dad hates you and you're fired and all of your friends leave and you're having magical dreams in which the entire world hates you and now your other best friend has been killed by the first one and - " I mean, at some point enough is enough, right? In a similar vein to this, Shallan's revelation this book didn't really have an impact for me. I know this has already been discussed in this thread, so I won't go into too much detail, but it just wasn't very meaningful with everything else that was going on. My very first reaction when she dropped her first "I have another secret" thing in the book was "haven't we already done this?" I was legitimately frustrated upon learning that because I thought we had finished the whole "Shallan killed someone in her past but can't remember" bit. Plus, the beginning of the book really sold the Three as a workable solution for me - having her plotline then be about merging with them didn't seem nearly as much like progress as he clearly meant it to. There were parts of Shallan's arc that I really liked this book, but most of it was undercut by the fact that I really wasn't interested in hearing another mysterious secret about her past. Upon reflection, these aren't unpopular opinions so much as just my criticism, but there you go.

The public perception of Cultivation's personality on Roshar: Cultivation's actual personality:

A bald man suggests Elantrian. He also does not eat or defacate or bathe. Either a Cognitive Shadow or an Elantrian. Shallan is a very educated woman. She may not speak Shin, but she would recognise it.

And what about that Kelsier interlude? Y’know, the one where he punched Odium? Pure gold.