Ansalem

Yeah, that's true, but I just wanted to come up with anything plausible real quick. I didn't think about it much beyond that.

I agree. There's nothing that says Odium has to still be the main villain by the end of the series. It could very easily be another Shard. There's still Cultivation, and from what little we know about her Shard, assuming she's on the side of civilization in any sense would be a mistake I think. What little help she's provided, assuming it even can be called "help", can very easily be attributed to nothing more than self-preservation. Or imagine Cultivation+Odium combined somehow, which would be a True Nightmare. Defeating Odium in the duel as it's been set up can happen without limiting the potential for the future 5 books. Just as a wild example, there's good reason to believe Harmony is gonna show up on Roshar in some capacity at some point. Maybe not in full but even just Ironeyes showing up could put a major kink in the plot. Hell it's even feasible Harmony could take on more Shards and end up being the major villain for the second half, but if he does I think he would have to wait for someone else to kill Odium/Cultivation first, the reason for both of those being his current conflicting nature. It's difficult for him to act so he waits for an opportunity and he would take up the other Shards to remove that limitation. He can barely hold a conversation without mentioning his frustration at being chained by his own power. On the flipside I can also see him thinking that Odium and Cultivation would neutralize each other in a similar way to the Shards he already holds and thinking it would be safest if he were to combine them in himself so no one else had to bear the burden, but in my view, not only are Odium and Cultivation not opposites, but Cultivation would actually act more like an amplifier of Odium. Thus Sazed accidentally becoming the Great Evil of the Cosmere. Again, that's just random thoughts, long winded as they are. I'm just saying there are other possibilities to explore without something necessarily having to actually intervene in the Champions' duel. For that matter, there are already forces sitting on the sidelines looking to profit that we know about for certain, not even counting other Shards. So for me I think the duel is going to go through and while there definitely will be some twists involved those twists won't be during the duel itself. What I actually expect right now is that either Dalinar will lose or he will win in some way that makes it so Taravangian can claim Cultivation's Shard somehow. Lose by winning the duel, as it were. I can't think of how that could work, but if Brandon can make that happen, holy hell would that be a twist. I think it's better to think of the main villain not as Odium but as Taravangian. That kinda got away from me, sorry about that.

I feel like he's said that himself but I might be making that up.

I agree we'll probably just never know, but here's my theory anyway. I don't think the merchant has items specifically Connected to Kaladin. I think it's similar to the way that Wit always knows where he's supposed to be. Which is to say, this merchant just happens to have whatever it is you need to find in that moment. Or more accurately, he has whatever it is he needs to be selling to that person in that moment, which is why Lift found Wit's flute to lead Kaladin to Tien's horse at that moment in his life. It may not even be something he's aware of himself. Not everyone who is Invested knows they're using magic. Hopefully that makes any kind of sense.

Yeah, I covered that too...

I meant if it isn't a projectile then none of the people who were close enough are Mraize or Iyatil. Those two are way too easy to spot. Also, Shallan knows everyone she brought with her. The only believable way any of them can be Mraize or Iyatil is illusion magic. And even then I figure Pattern would notice, but maybe not.

Well, if it actually turns into a murder mystery plot line, the most obvious suspect is also the least likely. In order for the most obvious to be the actual perpetrator, the story has to first convince you that it definitely isn't them somehow, otherwise it's just bad storytelling. Plus, if it were a projectile dart it'll still be stuck in Ialai and Shallan would have a suspect pool fully populated by Ghostbloods. If it isn't a projectile but still a poisoned needle/dart, then one of the people escorting Ialai must've done it. None of those people are either Mraize or Iyatil unless the Ghostbloods have some other source of illusion. Or just mind-bendingly good disguises which might as well be illusion magic. And either way they can't just leave without defeating the purpose of disguising themselves in the first place, so they'll just be discovered anyway. So I think we can rule out Mraize and Iyatil for either plot or logistical reasons. The Ghostbloods in general are still prime suspects, though. If it doesn't turn into a murder mystery, then yeah it probably is Mraize. But it'll also just be revealed next time Shallan has a chapter and that would be kinda boring.

Same. Knowing Brandon's general stance on representation in his stories I automatically wrote Shallan off as a possibility even before Shallan herself wondered about it. I had the benefit of recently learning about DID just as a general interest, though. However, Shallan suspecting herself even briefly does make sense. Especially in a world where her condition isn't even known about much less understood. She's having to figure it out on her own, more or less. She still seems to think it happened because she got too good at pretending to be other people. Her powers probably did exacerbate it but they weren't the cause. Her childhood was the cause, her powers are more like a catalyst. I think... well I hope that one of her truths will be understanding that her broken childhood isn't her fault.

Shardblades are the only type of blade it can't be. Shardblades in Shadesmar are just spren.

Well, that's not entirely true. The God King's aura separates white into a prismatic spray. But it's only white and only someone of the 10th heightening which is such a huge amount of Breath that they started a religion and government just to keep it safe. So we probably won't be seeing that again any time soon.

I'm thinking that wouldn't work. Breath is just another form of Investiture. If you could revive a deadeye with Breath then you should also be able to revive one with Stormlight. I think we can rule out that working. Someone would have tried it for sure by now. Plus there's the issue of Investiture resisting Investiture, which is why Shardplate protects against Shardblades. Spren are themselves made of pure Investiture, which is why you can trap one in a gemstone the same way you can Stormlight. So you probably couldn't push the Breath or Stormlight into one anyway. Or at least not in the amount necessary for revival if such a thing would technically work. Or perhaps just not fast enough. With all of that said, if anyone could do it, it would be Zahel.

Considering they're in Shadesmar, I doubt they're bismuth. Unless Shallan is holding a bead for bismuth crystals maybe. Shadesmar isn't made of physical matter. That doesn't mean it can't resemble physical things, though.

Could be, but I don't think Azure's blade looked any different in Shadesmar, did it? Though it and Nightblood aren't exactly the same thing they are both Awakened swords. Or at least that's the assumption. I suppose Azure's blade could be something entirely different but there's no reason to think that. I wonder what Honorblades look like in Shadesmar... Also, I think Adolin holding Nightblood is a really bad idea. Unless Adolin is a Radiant in RoW, Nightblood would kill him to hold.

That part I'm not sure about. But either Nalthis natives have a disadvantage or there's no difference. Being a Nalthis native isn't a benefit on its own is the main point I was getting at.

Only people from Nalthis are born with Breath. Anyone from anywhere can use Breath. Being from Nalthis wouldn't have any particular benefit over anyone else in that regard. They're only ever born with 1 Breath and it takes many Breaths to do anything with it. Everyone who uses Breath has to get it in the same way, from a lot of other people born on Nalthis. The only advantage related to Nalthis is if you're actually on Nalthis because that's where most of the Breath is. Anyone from anywhere has exactly the same advantages as long as they're on Nalthis. Actually someone from Nalthis is at a bit of a disadvantage in some sense because someone from elsewhere could lose their Breath with no drawbacks while a Nalthis native becomes a Drab without their Breath. Also, I don't think someone with Nalthis ancestry born on another planet would have Breath either. I'm pretty sure it's literally whether you're born on Nalthis or not because Breath comes from the Shard Endowment that is located on Nalthis. I could definitely be wrong, though.

Well, that's true but she can have knowledge of the other worlds without going to them. What I wonder is if that's only for going to the Physical Realm in other worlds or if Roshar spren can't even visit the Cognitive Realm of other worlds. I suspect they can go anywhere in the Cognitive. If that's true then I think what Jasnah is keeping hidden is her trip to Silverlight. Going to Silverlight is arguably a bigger deal than going to any of the other Shardworlds, anyway. Silverlight is very probably the most knowledgeable place in the Cosmere. Plus I imagine if she's been to Silverlight they may have sworn her to secrecy about it. She wouldn't want to get on the bad side of the greatest repository of knowledge in the universe. Though to be honest I don't really think Jasnah has been to SIlverlight yet. I think what she's keeping secret is more likely something we just don't know about yet that's much more directly related to what's happening on Roshar right now. Otherwise it's weird to even mention it from a storytelling perspective. But since I can't even guess at what that might be, Silverlight is my next best guess.

I don't see how that's treason. It wouldn't do anything to benefit the war effort and Jasnah is Queen of Alethkar. Is she committing treason against herself? Besides it wouldn't be treason regardless. That's like saying the first person who discovered that the Earth revolves around the Sun would have been a traitor for not telling people about it. If you think that's treason then I'm glad you're not a ruler.

That's not exactly accurate. He isn't siding with Odium, he's siding with the Singers. At the moment they may be the same thing, but if the Singers start to split from Odium Nale will go with them. I'll be interested to see what he does when Singers start to switch sides while the Fused stick with Odium, since that's the most likely imo. I'm inclined to think he's specifically following the Fused since he's basically chosen sides based on who has the earliest claim to Roshar, but perhaps he'll instead base it on the majority of the race rather than its oldest individual members. So in the end it might always be the same as siding with Odium but I think the distinction is worth considering. In any case, he probably won't be taking orders from Odium directly.

To be fair, that threat is the same regardless. But I agree with your assessment. War is inherently honorless. Not always necessarily dishonorable, but there's no honor to be gained through war. Especially not when the goal of one or both sides is genocide as is the case here. For my part, I think the Fused take this dueling tactic for the simple reason that they enjoy it. It's not more or less honorable either way, and the stakes are roughly the same either way, so neither reason makes sense to me. If it's not for honor and it's not for strategy then what's left? They do it because they like it better.

My first guess would be knowledge of other worlds and probably Silverlight. If any Radiant would be a Worldhopper it would be an Elsecaller. Plus she's a scientist and historian. And keeping this information secret probably wouldn't make much difference for the war effort. If anything, sharing it might serve as more of a distraction than a help. Aside from things we just can't know about yet, that makes the most sense to me. Well, it's really the only thing I can think of, to be honest.

It's a good idea, but I'm not sure Renarin is up to the task. He's not very well coordinated. Knowing where to aim doesn't mean you can hit it. But if throwing a light ball has more to do with intention than physical ability, it could work quite well.

That's definitely not how that works. Pattern isn't Pattern's name. His name is numbers. Shallan named him Pattern and he liked it so that's what he goes by. Hoid most likely knows all of that, or he decided independently to use the same name for the same reason Shallan did. The spren he found didn't say its name was Pattern, Hoid just called it that. Honorspren all have different names. We've met a few of them in OB.

Honestly, I don't think that's the real issue. Crem alone makes it almost an inconceivable task to operate a railway. You can't run a train on a track that gets caked over in clay along its entire length every few days. The amount of maintenance needed would be astronomical. Not to mention it would take more time to clean than it would take to get covered again unless you had an army dedicated to it. And even then... Maybe it's possible to create a fabrial that could do it, but I honestly think a railroad cleaning fabrial will be much more complicated than anything they have right now. Strangely enough, I'm not at all surprised they figured out air vehicles before land vehicles on Roshar. Protection from highstorms wouldn't be that big a deal really, especially in comparison. All you really need is accurate predictions and places along the track where you can switch the train into shelter when necessary. They already had good predictions before the Everstorm, and they'll get that figured out too eventually unless Odium keeps moving it manually.

I think you're seriously underestimating the staying power of a religion after it's been proven beyond doubt to be wrong. People are remarkably good at believing things that are provably wrong.

The bleeding could be caused by the shape of the weapon. He stabs the tip of the spear in which is sharp at the point so it doesn't leave a physical wound but it might not be sharp along the sides so when he rips through her shoulder the blunt side might tear the flesh? I don't think there's been any description in any of the books of any kind of Shard weapon being yanked out of someone along the flat/round edge of a Blade/Spear. So it would be weird if that's the explanation without it being explicitly stated, but just something to consider in general not just for this particular set of scenes.