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I've been thinking of this theory for a while and have shared in a couple of places, but I think that anyone with the correct connection can use god metals as metalminds, similarly to how anyone with the correct connection can burn a god metal. Nobody in text has tried storing into pure atium or lerasium. There was too little lerasium and atium has only ever been seen as an alloy. Harmonium seems to act very similarly to a metalmind. I think harmonium store kinetic investiture the same way nicrosil stores innate investiture (or whatever term best describes the ability to use investiture). I think because of its unstable nature the stored attribute isn't able to stay and leaks out which causes the effect seen in the books. This leads to the question, why haven't other worlds used their godmetals as metalminds? Feruchemy requires intent and without knowing what feruchemy is or what the metals would store they couldn't use it. It is possible that other worlds have used it. The honorblades in Stormlight Archives act almost the exact same way as unsealed metalminds, which is what got me thinking about this theory. Trellium seems like an outlier as it was common enough that they should have tried using it feruchemically or allomantically it but as far as we are aware did not. I think this might be because Autonomy naturally repels all other forms of investiture and thus can't be used. I'm not convinced of this explanation because Trellium is used in hemalurgy just fine, but I don't know why else it wouldn't have been tried Are there any WOBs that disprove this theory? I couldn't find any.

Mild era 2 spoilers: For those who don’t know, each shard has a God Metal associated with it (Lerasium, Atium, Raysium, etc.), and Harmony’s God Metal is Harmonium, or Ettmetal. Ettmetal is very hard to experiment with, due to it exploding whenever it comes in contact with water, and its Allomatic, Feruchemical, and Hemalurgical abilities are all unknown. I have no idea what its abilities in Allomancy or Hemalurgy would be, but I think anyone could store something in a Ettmetal metalmind, and storing would have no effect, but tapping would make you a full Feruchemist. The main reason I think this is how Atium and especially Lerasium work. Those are the god metals of Ruin and Preservation, which both are associated with magic systems, Hemalurgy and Allomancy. When Lerasium is burned (it can be burned by anyone) it turns the burner into a Mistborn, and an Atium spike steals any power, the crux of what Hemalurgy is. In both of those examples, using a God Metal in the Metallic art associated with it makes you able to use all of the more minor powers associated with (doesn’t fit exactly with Hemalurgy). So, I think Ettmetal has the same effect on Feruchemy. My theory is also somewhat supported by this WoB:

So, I was just thinking about how God Metals somewhat reflect the properties of their Shard (Lerasium Connects someone to Preservation, Atium makes people into efficient killing machines) and thought of something. Harmony's God Metal is so reactive because his two halves are polarised against each other and are locked in an uneasy equilibrium, and so is pressurized in a sense, which is why it seeks to escape by reacting with something. If Harmony's Intent switches to Discord, and the two halves are no longer in equilibrium, that pressure of them straining against each other goes away. We know from a WoB that I can't find right now that a God Metal's properties can change over time if the Vessel changes; could the same be true for a shift in Intent and the nature of the Shard? Once Harmony becomes Discord, could Harmonium (Discordium?) become less or even unreactive, and therefore be used to finally test out its Allomantic, Feruchemical, and Hemalurgiv properties? What are your thoughts?

When Harmonium reacts with Trellium, there is a massive explosion like that of an atomic bomb. It makes perfect sense to me that this would be the result. Why? Because Harmonium atoms should share in Harmony’s nature as a partnership between two, and Autonomy, being, well, autonomous, probably abhors partnership. So of course Trellium splits Harmonium into separate, autonomous parts. And since Harmonium is an atom, when it splits, it splits like atoms do: with a boom. I doubt other godmetals explode when combined. These two metals split because of the nature of their Shards’ Intents.

So Ettmetal seems to be able to replicate any nearby Allomantic or Feruchemical abilities, and does so at range like lowering to weight of an entire airship. So if someone were to have of the 'Primer Cubes' as well as several Unsealed Metalminds, could they use the Medallions to 'Prime' the cube with an attribute, like Health for instance, grant everyone around them additional Health and have them store it in other Unsealed Metalminds? Like a slightly more complicated and less effective version of Compounding. Without any need of any Metalborn, except for creating the Medallions in the first place.

Putting my crem theory out here while overanalyzing linguistics. So, the "ett" part in ettmetal is most likely derived from the word en/ett which translates to one (think un/une in french minus the gendering) in most nordic languages. I've seen someone suggest "the one metal" as an interpretation, which is completely valid and I think it sounds great. But may I raise you: United metal! If something is described as being "one" my first thought is that it is combined or united. Which fits given that it is Harmony's own metal, who is the literal embodiment of two combined/united shards. It's a bit of a reach, but I find the implications interesting when considering how important unity is in regards to stormlight and how it appears to be about rebuilding and combining the shards. (For clarity I am a fluent speaker in only one nordic language so my perspective is somewhat skewed based on that as there are things that differ between them, the phrasing stood out to me because it would be grammatically wrong in my language and therefore puts emphasis on it being one rather than just a metal. Tho I do doubt that it was Sanderson's intention since I believe it's correct in Norweigan which he appears to lean into more given the use of "konge" in the book. Either way it's a fun coincidence.)

Why does burning Chromium not effect Ettmetal that much? Is it just a special product of how Ettmetal works that it interacts with Leeching in a different way, or does the Leeching burn through the Ettmetal faster than other metals?

What if Marsh tried burning Harmonium while compounding healing? Would It just vaporize when exploding? This was an interesting question asked by one of my friends.

The ettmetal primer cube buzzes when charged with Allomancy. Do we know what frequency it buzzes at or if it changes based on the metal being burned? It occured to me that it probably buzzes to the same pulse pattern that Seekers detect, or at least to pattern or frequency unique to each metal. If it does, then you have a mechanical method of detecting what allomancy the ettmetal is currently burning. Any engineers or programmers see a way to use something like this that has 16 buzzing states specifically tied to the metal being burned? Thoughts?

Hi all, I listened to the Medallions of South Scadrial podcast recently and had a few observations about the book that I haven't been able to find addressed, though it's possible it's in the forums and I just haven't found it from searching. In no particular order, here goes: First, kandra generally don't know how to access the metallic arts other than what they get from their blessings, with the exception of Paalm, right? Except, apparently MeLaan can use the weight medallions. Apparently this doesn't interfere with her blessings (at least in these numbers), so Southern tech can grant Feruchemy and presumably Allomancy to kandra without having to resort to a Trellium spike. That's pretty neat, and it's just glossed over in the concept that everyone can get these powers now, but I think that's a non-trivial point considering how effective Bleeder was at doing things. Second, the ettmetal Allomantic grenade was odd to me, also in what I consider a significant way. When Wax charged the grenade and threw it, this little cube would throw presumably much heavier guns and equipment aside in its path, not following the usual Newtonian physics we see in Pushes and Pulls in which I would have expected the cube to get deflected from the much heavier weapons sometimes held in soldier's hands. No one in the books comments on this being odd, but it confused me for quite some time. We've seen Steel pushes and Iron pulls work on most metals, even Atium quite readily, while having problems "sensing" heavily invested metals such as metalminds and the Bands of Mourning. I seem to recall Brandon saying that he wishes he had done Atium differently if he had known how the Cosmere was going to develop, and I wonder if Atium would have also been resistant to Pushing and Pulling. Moving on, my theory is that this wasn't an error on the part of the physics of the Allomantic grenade, but that Pushes and Pulls are not using only physical mass in their calculation but more an "Invested mass". A godmetal with a presumably higher Investiture density Pushing against the ordinary metal weapons could push with more strength perhaps. Third, an aspect of the medallions that I don't get. Why can multiple people store weight in the medallions? Does their Identity not matter in process of storing in the metal, or is this a weird aspect of the construction of the medallions? Alternately, is this just an aspect of Feruchemy that has never come up, that multiple people can store attributes in a metalmind, but they could only withdraw their own storage? It seems odd to me, where I can see withdrawing from an unkeyed mind would work just fine, but I'm not sure on storing in an unkeyed mind. Fourth, at the end, presumably Kelsier stores a memory in a copper medallion. So... whatever mechanism that they are doing with the medallions allows copper memory storage that other people can access (which revolutionizes information storage), or it means that Kelsier has gained at least a Copper Ferring's abilities right? Fifth, another thing that seems highly relevant: Wax and Marasi were able to use the Bands of Mourning. Either from the mechanics of creating them, some aspect of Identity and time that I don't know about, or whatever, for some reason the Bands of Mourning were not Keyed to Kelsier. If Kelsier wanted to make a weapon for himself to reclaim that happened to be a metalmind that he could use, why not make it keyed through Identity to himself? Unless it always a test and he actually meant for someone to find something that powerful on the doorstep to his temple.

Hi all, I listened to the Medallions of South Scadrial podcast recently and had a few observations about the book that I haven't been able to find addressed, though it's possible it's in the forums and I just haven't found it from searching. In no particular order, here goes: First, kandra generally don't know how to access the metallic arts other than what they get from their blessings, with the exception of Paalm, right? Except, apparently MeLaan can use the weight medallions. Apparently this doesn't interfere with her blessings (at least in these numbers), so Southern tech can grant Feruchemy and presumably Allomancy to kandra without having to resort to a Trellium spike. That's pretty neat, and it's just glossed over in the concept that everyone can get these powers now, but I think that's a non-trivial point considering how effective Bleeder was at doing things. Second, the ettmetal Allomantic grenade was odd to me, also in what I consider a significant way. When Wax charged the grenade and threw it, this little cube would throw presumably much heavier guns and equipment aside in its path, not following the usual Newtonian physics we see in Pushes and Pulls in which I would have expected the cube to get deflected from the much heavier weapons sometimes held in soldier's hands. No one in the books comments on this being odd, but it confused me for quite some time. We've seen Steel pushes and Iron pulls work on most metals, even Atium quite readily, while having problems "sensing" heavily invested metals such as metalminds and the Bands of Mourning. I seem to recall Brandon saying that he wishes he had done Atium differently if he had known how the Cosmere was going to develop, and I wonder if Atium would have also been resistant to Pushing and Pulling. Moving on, my theory is that this wasn't an error on the part of the physics of the Allomantic grenade, but that Pushes and Pulls are not using only physical mass in their calculation but more an "Invested mass". A godmetal with a presumably higher Investiture density Pushing against the ordinary metal weapons could push with more strength perhaps. Third, an aspect of the medallions that I don't get. Why can multiple people store weight in the medallions? Does their Identity not matter in process of storing in the metal, or is this a weird aspect of the construction of the medallions? Alternately, is this just an aspect of Feruchemy that has never come up, that multiple people can store attributes in a metalmind, but they could only withdraw their own storage? It seems odd to me, where I can see withdrawing from an unkeyed mind would work just fine, but I'm not sure on storing in an unkeyed mind. Fourth, at the end, presumably Kelsier stores a memory in a copper medallion. So... whatever mechanism that they are doing with the medallions allows copper memory storage that other people can access (which revolutionizes information storage), or it means that Kelsier has gained at least a Copper Ferring's abilities right? Fifth, another thing that seems highly relevant: Wax and Marasi were able to use the Bands of Mourning. Either from the mechanics of creating them, some aspect of Identity and time that I don't know about, or whatever, for some reason the Bands of Mourning were not Keyed to Kelsier. If Kelsier wanted to make a weapon for himself to reclaim that happened to be a metalmind that he could use, why not make it keyed through Identity to himself? Unless it always a test and he actually meant for someone to find something that powerful on the doorstep to his temple.

Past WoBs have confirmed that ettmetal, Harmony's godmetal, is distinct from an alloy of atium and lerasium. So I've been wondering for a while if creating harmonium was possible prior to the catascendre, when ruin and preservation were still distinct entities. Could Ati and Leras have worked together to create it? Now, we have potentially new info on the topic: Warlight and Tower light. Obviously, this is gaseous investiture but it seems safe to assume that what was done to them could be done to the godmetals, in some fashion. Possibly through different means, but I feel very safe in assuming that something could be done to create a godmetal equivalent of Warlight and Towerlight. The question is, what was done to them? Is this closer to an alloy, or is it closer to ettmetal? If it's the latter, then that would imply that yes, ettmetal could have been created prior to harmony. But if it's closer to being like the alloy, then the question is still up in the air

After RoW I've been thinking of the uses Anti-Invesiture can have not only in Stormlight, but in the Cosmere as a whole. I started thinking about Scadrial and Ettmetal. We have a WoB that says that both Atium and Lerasium can be extracted from Ettmetal I'm guessing that those "not normal, mechanical means" are the use of Anti-Investiture. We know that Anti-Investiture repels normal Investiture. So maybe if they can get Ettmetal to a level where it isn't as reactive as it is normally, you could separate Ruin's and Preservation's Investiture aka Atium and Lerasium. What we know about this process is that it can't be done on solid Ettmetal (since they use Raysium to conduct Anti-Voidlight in RoW) so maybe in a liquid state —which is possible since Malatium could be created from Atium— there could be a way to use either Ruin's or Preservation's Anti-Tone to separate their individual Investitures. If there's a way to create undiluted Mistborn (and possibly Full Feruchemists with an alloy of Lerasium) that could give Scadrial a lot of power and there could possibly be a Lerasium and Atium trade.

Okay, me going through the thread talking about Harmony Blades when I started thinking about Ettmetal's (Harmony's Godmetal) properties, like the fact it explodes, making it pretty bad for normal uses people would have for metals. And I know there is the explanation the reason Harmony's metal explodes is because of the powers of Preservation and Ruin being represented and all that, but why would Harmony, the supposed perfect mix of the two shards, be represented in a metal that explodes? Why would it be so reactive? I would think it would be more like a noble gas and just not react with anything. So I see two potential explanations. Either 1. Ettmetal is more likely the godmetal of Discord, which would make more sense. An explosion seems like a nice representation of discord. However, this doesn't completely work because for now, as it doesn't seem like Sazed is Discord and it might have even been stated that ettmetal is Harmony's god metal. And then there's the fact I tend to push back at the theory that Sazed is Discord because I imagine if he was, it would be very destructive for the Scadrians, but maybe he is more in Discord with himself and is still conscious enough to not end up screwing over the planet he cares about. Something to think about. The other explanation is 2. the metal is currently symbolizing Sazed's struggle with the powers and that's why it' so reactive right now, because he still hasn't figured out how to deal with the contrasting intents, and the metal will eventually start to change as Sazed gains mastery of his abilities, becoming less and less reactive, as ettmetals abilities seem to be more about it weird storing and realizing of investiture rather than it's reactivity. So maybe one-day Ettmetal, or at least further production of ettmetal, will become stable, like a normal metal. (Also, random thought that popped in my head, but when Shardblades are summoned, they are covered in condensation, which would be bad for a metal that explodes when in contact with water. Wonder if there's a connection there.)

We know that lerasium's alloys created various types of mistings, we also know that lerasium's alloys gave various enhancement and physical effects. We know that atium's alloys gave various mental and temporal effects. This brings me to two theories. Theory 1: Ettmetal's alloys would all give a physical, mental, temporal and enhancement effect (due to it (in a way, not exactly) being a combination of atium and lerasium). Theory 2: Trellium and Trellium's alloys (because Trellium is a God Metal) would have their own quadrants dedicated to them, these could not be one of the four quadrants we know because Ettmetal has effects of those quadrants. This means there is (mostly likely 2) quadrants of allomancy, feruchemy, and hemalurgy that are used in the same manner as the metallic arts but are actually just Trell's investiture on Scadrial. These would be separated from the other 16 metals and would be considered their own...thing.

Because a pandemic of some sort has left me unoccupied recently, I'm writing up this highly speculative theory about the creation of medallions. Long text is long, so there is a point you can skip to if you don't care about the justification behind some of the spectulation. This topic has seen a lot of research, the most reasonable being, in my opinion, Calderis' theory: One thing that makes me doubt this is the method employed by the Southerners is that Allik speaks about multiple power medallions as if they are an accumulative work: There is much we don't know about the topic, and it seems Brandon won't tell us much until he finally unveils the answer in TLM, so we have to make due with what he have. What I propose is one way a medallion could be made, which is most likely not the way they currently make them. I will work on the assumption that this WoB is correct: Which coincidentally allows me to speak about something that doesn't feel right about Calderis' theory: it is straightforward. Yet there have been multiple ocassions where Brandon has been asked about the creation of medallions, and his reply is, like in this instance, that he would have to check his notes, or ask Peter, and the answer apparently needs a flowchart: That being said, this is what I got. I address the fact that the nicrosil portion is never tapped, and the fact that no hemalurgy should be required if Brandon was not mistaken in the first WoB. As a summary, the idea relies on priming cubes to accumulate multiple powers into a single nicrosil storage, and then to use priming machinery like the one on BoM's airship to create the auto-tapping nicrosil ring. There are multiple points I can't explain, but I think there is some merit to this thought process, and perhaps someone else will be able to build something stronger from this theory. Let's begin with small assumptions, namely about the way priming cubes behave under the effects of Allomancy and Feruchemy. We have seen priming cubes used with A-Steel, A-Cadmium and A-Chromium. In all cases the observed effect is that the output of the allomancer's burn is reproduced by the cube, with some harmonium burned away, as if the cube was metal burning inside the allomancer. From Irich's PoV we know there is a method of operation that allows some mechanism to be primed so that it makes something else ligher, and the priming involves a ferring: I believe it would be consistent to expect that storing into an iron metalmind while holding the primer cube would cause it to work as if it was iron being stored into by a feruchemist. This would have the effect of funneling weight from nearby people, though apparently it can be worked to funnel weight from its environment as well (airship becoming lighter). Of course we don't really know how the ship gets lighter, and it would be a valid criticism of this text. It would be somewhat reasonable that the cube could funnel feruchemical attributes from people, as it could be doing so by preventing investiture from flowing from the Spiritual Realm to the Physical making the attribute stop being manifested (i.e. weight being removed), the excess being stored in the ettmetal as any other feruchemical store or getting shunted back to the SR. But what would it mean to prime the cube by tapping an attribute? In particular, the important question is what effect should that have on inanimate objects. When the cube replicates allomancy, it gets burned, presumably to fuel the allomancy. When it draws attributes, it is just behaving as a metalmind, storing a charge, (though I don't think the charge would actually be stored, it just gets siphoned into oblivion, like some people think happens when you store into aluminum). If it were primed by tapping a charge, the cube would have to provide the excess investiture like it does with allomancy. This is problematic, as either you would need to store before being able to tap, or the investiture that makes up the ettmetal would have to fuel the effect. I don't think it makes sense for the ettmetal to fuel the feruchemy by decreasing its investiture level (i.e. desaturating itself) or something like that. If the ettmetal fuels the feruchemical output, I think it would have to work like it does with allomancy, burning itself to provide the effect, as if it was a metalmind being compounded. These are the assumptions I am working on, and I concede they are wildly speculative, but under these premises this is how I envision the origin of the Bands of Mourning: IF LAZY, SKIP HERE! We will require a ferring and misting of each type along with some strategic twinborns, some ettmetal, and no spiky things. Arbitrary Unkeyed Metalminds. The first step is to be able to produce an unkeyed metalmind. An aluminum ferring stores Identity while holding a primer cube. The cube responds by drawing Identity from anyone close by. Any feruchemical charge stored while the cube is working will be clear of Identity, free to be used by any ferring of that metal. Adding Powers to Nicrosil. The second step is to create an unkeyed nicrosil metalmind, with a storage of F-Nicrosil. This can be done by a nicrosil ferring storing their ability under the influence of the Identity-clearing grenade. The resulting metalmind allows any twinborn with access to A-Nicrosil to store their feruchemical ability into a nicrosil metalmind, which can easily be cleared of Identity with the same procedure. The twinborn burns the nicrosil metalmind, compounding the charge that gives them access to F-Nicrosil, allowing them to store their feruchemical power into a nicrosil metalmind. Notice that at this point we can create a sealed version of the Bands of Mourning that can only be used by nicrosil metalborn: To add an Allomantic power, we need a twinborn with that power and F-Nicrosil. The individual stores their allomantic ability while being identity-cleared, resulting in a net power addition to the master nicrosil metalmind. To add a Feruchemical power, we need a twinborn with that power and A-Nicrosil. The individual burns an unkeyed nicrosil metalmind that has been filled with the ability to use F-Nicrosil. During the burn, the charge gets compounded and the twinborn becomes a nicrosil ferring for the duration of the burn, allowing them to store their feruchemical ability into the master nicrosil metalmind. The limit to the amount of powers that can be added is the availability of suitable twinborn and ettmetal. If this was no issue, once all allomantic and feruchemical powers had been stored, the master nicrosil metalmind could be burned by a A-Nicrosil misting while priming the cube producing a Fullborn grenade, though it's effects would by necessity be temporary: A powerless person could perhaps store all powers while under the effects of the grenade, but once its effects decayed they would no longer have access to F-nicrosil. So this method of granting powers is short-lived, and can only be initiated by a nicrosil ferring, and does not qualify as a mechanical mean of accessing Invested Arts like medallions or honorblades do. The next section provides even more outrageous speculation in order to provide a solution to this problem From the excerp I quoted from BoM, it would seem an airship can be primed into being made lighter. While there is a perhaps deceivingly obvious implication, there are a couple extra details that we can infer from this fact. Objects, not only people, can store feruchemical atributes, or at the very least they can see their flow of investiture altered in such a way that the physical manifestation of those attributes are dimishised. The duration of the decrease in the attribute needn't be the same as the duration of the priming. Otherwise the ship would not be viable, because you would need to prime its weight for as long as the expected duration of the flight, which at any reasonable pace would take hours if not days. Ultimately, this weight-changing airship implies that a being without innate feruchemical powers can be forced to store an attribute. This strikes suspiciously close to giving a person a power they don't have! Sadly I can't see any additional info about the weight changing mechanism to explain it's inner workings. From Irich's chapter the ship appears to have a lattice of some lightweight metal couple with some other set of metal wires, plus a golden plate in the shape of a ship. I do believe these are somehow trying to reinforce the cognitive aspect of the ship, somehow making it more aware. In fact I think the pattern of metals going all over the ship is very similar to the lines of strata on the walls of Urithiru, with the gemstone pilar being replaced by a golden plate. In any case, I don't have any additional ideas on this. Therefore, I will assume that the weight changing machinery can be primed by storing an attribute while holding a priming cube, with some unknown extra steps. So if storing weight causes the cube to expand the effect, forcing its surroundings to store weight, what would tapping imply for other feruchemical uses? This is where the amount of unknowns is too big to form a coherent argument with supporting evidence, and so at this point everything is unsupported and likely invalid. I assume that priming the airship works because something in the weight changing machinery defines the airship as the target, and because the ship is in contact with a decent amount of iron it can store its weight into the iron. Perhaps that same machinery could be made to target a ring of nicrosil filled with an unkeyed charge of F-Nicrosil. If you were to store your ability to use your allomantic/feruchemical power while priming the cube -which is set to target the ring and only the ring- the piece of nicrosil would try to store its investiture into its environment. Now, I accept that this is wishful thinking, but maybe this ring would not be able to store anything because there is no amount of nicrosil metal nearby. The physical/spiritual makeup of the nicrosil is what allows it to be a recipient of that specific kind of charge: of Innate Investiture, the ability to use allomancy/feruchemy. Just like only iron has a structure such that it can hold a charge of weight. But nicrosil is not the only suitable recipient of Innate Investiture that grants access to Metallic Arts: people can hold a lot of the stuff. So, a nicrosil ring is looking for a suitable recipient, its charge having no way out but is under pressure to escape because it has been primed to do so by the effect of the ettmetal. A person touches this nicrosil ring, the charge finds an outlet it can flow into, and the person receives the ability to use allomancy/feruchemy as it was originally stored into the ring. This is the reason we never see anyone tap the nicrosil portion of the medallions: the nicrosil is not working as a metalmind, it is working as an entity with access to f-nicrosil, and the wearer is the metalmind being stored into. Of course this doesn't fully work, as it doesn't explain why there is an apparent limit of three powers to a medallion. I cannot explain the fact that the nicrosil ring never runs out, or that the charge is 'given back' to the medallion once the user stops touching it. I don't believe this is how the Southerners are actually making the medallions, as I believe they do use hemalurgy, which could explain both the three power limit (see Calderis' theory) and the nicrosil charge being 'discrete' like memories in a coppermind. Perhaps replacing the steps that involve storing F-Nicrosil with stealing (Excising ) f-nicrosil would give rise to the medallions we know and love. I do want to add some thoughts about the three power limit: could it be that this is a Cosmere-wide limit to the number of abilities granted by the same mechanical method? Medallions are limited to three powers, as Allik tells us: It doesn't mean there is a hard limit on the number of powers, as it could simply be that the tech level is not quite there but could be reached. If we do operate on the assumption that it is a hard limit, where else have we seen anecdotal recalling of three powers being granted, at most? There is this from Sixth of the Dusk: Same situation, we have an observer telling us about a grand maximum of three powers, but no explicit mention that more is impossible. Finally, there is this from Kaza's Interlude in Oathbringer: Which implies Fabrial Soulcasters have three modes of operation, whatever they might be. The most obvious inference is that each 'mode' is one essence, corresponding to each of the three gemstones each Soulcaster can hold. I believe these quotes add credence towars a Cosmere hard limit of three powers given by the same mechanical means. Of course more than three can be achieved through different systems (three powers from medallions and three from hemalurgy, as we know it can be done as we see Suit use a medallion while having three spikes) or through hacks (granting a single power, that of F-Nicrosil, that allows access to a unkeyed storage of any arbitrary set of powers). But this system-specific limit is reasonable even without an in-world reason, as it would prevent scenarios in Era 4 where everyone can be a Fullborn Radiant of ten surges. Though I acknowledge a major flaw: there are WoBs that mention you could bond 5 Honorblades, but this should not be feasible if this limit exists.

First, a recap of what we know about Harmonium: -It explodes when it contacts water -It copies the effects of whatever Allomantic ability is used nearby (Burning steel nearby would make it steelpush as well) -Burns with "a pure whiteness" when it's duplicating Allomantic effects -It slowly uses itself up when copying an ability With those in mind, my theory is that the Harmonium duplicates abilities by converting its mass into raw investiture, which then aligns with whatever "flavour" of investiture is being used. Here's why: Brandon Sanderson did say that what it's doing is akin to the way matter can be converted into energy, and that it's really unstable because it's Spiritual nature (a very delicately held balance of Preservation and Ruin) is unstable, and will tear itself apart if given the chance (it's sort of the opposite of The Stick). When it the Spiritual identity tears itself apart, that Spiritual energy is released into the Physical realm, causing an explosion. I believe that when ettmetal burns itself out when copying abilities, the metal is reacting with the water vapour in the air to create a slower, more controlled version of that Spiritual energy explosion. This continuous reaction produces small amounts of Spiritual energy, seen in the white light produced by it's burning. I like to think of that Spiritual energy as "unflavoured" investiture, sort of like how a stem cell is waiting to become any other cell. This "unflavoured" investiture then keys into whatever "flavour" of Allomancy is present, similar to how stem cells will typically turn into the same type of cell that is nearby. This would explain how Harmonium can copy Allomantic abilities used nearby. Answers to possible counterarguments: 1. If ettmetal reacts to water vapour as well, why doesn't it burn itself out when allomantic abilities aren't used nearby? My answer to this is that Harmonium won't react to such small amounts of water for the same reason that Stormlight doesn't soulcast everything around it without someone actively trying to soulcast. Soulcasting works by convincing the "soul" of a material to change it's Spiritual identity to that of another material using Stormlight (Honor's investiture) as a sort of bribe. But the "soul" will not change without a direction or idea of what it should change into, even if you have a huge amount of investiture. Similarly, Harmonium won't react with water vapour to produce "unflavoured" investiture if there isn't a flavour of investiture to key into. 2. So why is it that throwing liquid water onto it causes it to react if water vapour won't for the reasons stated in question 1? I think that it has to do with the nature of Harmonium's Spiritual identity. Harmonium's Identity does want to change, it has a direction it wants to go in, which is "not Harmonium". It's identity is made of two things that really, really don't want to be together, Preservation and Ruin. If water acts as a trigger for the opposing intents of Preservation and Ruin in the metal to react, then small amounts of water won't be enough to trigger the metal to change itself, but a large enough amount of water should be enough for the metal to react and change as it's identity wants it to. Again, it's similar to one of the characteristics of soulcasting, that even if you have the direction for the material to change into, you need enough Stormlight to convince the soul of the object. If we consider water as acting on Ettmetal in the same way that Stormlight acts on souls (a reason/motivation to change), then having enough water be enough for Ettmetal to change into the direction it wanted to in the first place. This is my first theory, so I welcome any questions and criticisms with open arms.

Since Sazed currently holds Ruin, Hemalurgy is of him now. Since he also holds Preservation, calling the combination Harmony, he also has an entirely new godmetal that we saw in BoM. Duscovered by the Southern Scadrians, who call it Ettmetal and use it to power their ships, create powerful bombs as well as Allomantic grenades. This metal is explosive on contact with water, Brandon compared it with Cesium. As we saw with the Inquisitors, Hemalurgic constructs can survive wounds inflicted by the spike and in fact, alter the receiver's biology so that they can survive being impaled. The Inquisitors' brains itself was reshaped to allow the spikes to pass through, as well as, it seems their skeletal structure and muscular structure as well as possibly a few internal organs and their circulatory system. So couldn't their body do something to accommodate a Harmonium spike? It doesn't solve the problem of the spike degrading or getting damaged or exploding while it's still... passing through the donor, but I'm hoping you all could provide some theories for that end. Now, assuming success of such a venture, what power(s) do(es) Harmonium steal? Feruchemy can sidestep the godmetal's reaction with water, provided the Feruchemist takes a few precautions like covering up their metalmind so as to not expose it to water. So what would a Harmonium metalmind store?

Here are a few Ideas I had on future use of Ettmetal in the Mistborn world. Ettmetal round bullets: Ettmetal is extremely reactive with water and we assume blood. If you made bullets out of this stuff its essentially explosive rounds except far more deadly. Investiture warding juewelry: We know that Ettmetal can copy allomantic powers. If you were to have Ettmetal jewelry that copied Aluminum allomancy then it will purge your soul of unwanted investiture. This will essentially make you immune to direct forms of Investiture. Although it will probably also wipe all of your allomantic and feruchmic reserves. Ettmetal guns: Guns made from Ettmetal that copies steel allomancy. This gun will be able to fire bullets extremely fast without the kickback. What are some other Ideas you guys have for future uses of Ettmetal.

If Atium and Lerasium are named after the holders of the Shards, then why isn't Ettmetal called Sazium, or something like that?

Sorry if this has been discussed already, but it occurred to me that it might be possible to ingest ettmetal. Like, if you completely coated it in a specific metal that would be suitable to an Allomancer (i.e. tin for Tineyes and pewter for Thugs) and then got them to swallow and burn the metal? Then once that metal is completely burned away, then the ettmetal is all that remains in the stomach, and its natural reaction to liquids -- in this case, the stomach juices -- causes it to explode while inside the person's body, effectively killing them. This may be done discreetly by one person to another as an assassination or intentionally to oneself as a self-sacrifice. In short, ettmetal could be used like an Allomantic cyanide pill. How likely of a possibility to y'all think that is?

Ok, I'm going to start this off by warning you, there are going to be a LOT of spoilers. If you haven't read at least to the end of BoM, please go away lest I spoil Mistborn for you. Still with me? Ok, so I'm going to start off by stating a few simple facts. Allomancy is of Preservation (I don't really like how that sounds, but it'll do for now). Lerasium is also of Preservation. Lerasium makes you able to burn any allomantic metal. Hemalurgy is of Ruin. Atium is of Ruin. Atium can steal anything through hemalurgy. Feruchemy is of Ruin and Preservation, a.k.a. Harmony. Ettmetal is of Harmony. You see where I'm going with this? Were the shard in question not Harmony, I would go about this in a different way, but it is, so this is going to be a whole lot simpler and less guesswork involved. Lerasium and Atium are two God metals, and the magic systems made by the same shard as the shard who made the god metals. This allowed anyone who used them in that magic system could then do anything in that magic system. Since both feruchemy and ettmetal are from the same shard (Harmony), then this should mean that ettmetal should be able to do anything in that magic system, in this case, feruchemy (I'll get onto what that means in a second). You could argue that this is only true for Ruin and Preservation, but Harmony is Ruin and Preservation, so yeah. If Ettmetal were to be able to let you do anything in feruchemy, what would that mean? Well, let's look at what it could mean, explain why, then rule out the ones that seem unlikely. Anyone can tap/store in ettmetalmids Anyone can access whatever is stored in an ettmetalmind Only full feruchemists can use ettmetalminds Any attribute can be stored in an ettmetalmind There may be more that I missed out, but that's it for now. Please tell me of other things it could mean. So, no. 1. I think this might be possible because of the similarities between allomancy and feruchemy. Simply put, lerasium allows anyone to use allomancy. The power is given, which correlates to how allomancy works, the power must be given because Preservation cannot destroy or take. Atium can steal and attribute or power in hemalurgy. This correlates to how hemalurgy works, something must be taken, since Ruin can only destroy. Feruchemy works by both giving and taking. Thus, nothing can be given to the person using the ettmetalmind, so they couldn't magically become a feruchemist. However, if anyone could use the ettmetalmind, that would be a property of the metal, and wouldn't be giving or taking anything to or from the person using the ettmetalmind. Overall, this seems fairly likely. no. 2. This seems pretty unlikely as you can already do that by storing in an aluminiummind (or aluminummind, if you're American), so I'm going to rule it out (for now). 2. Anyone can access whatever is stored in an ettmetalmind no.3 Since I based this off of how only mistborns can use god metals except for lerasium, which is part of Preservation, this is pretty unlikely, as ettmetal is part of harmony. However, the heory may work if it was changed to fit any god metal other than ettmetal in feruchemy. 3. Only full feruchemists can use ettmetalminds no. 4. This may be possible in the same way anyone can become a mistborn if they burn lerasium, so I'm going to leave it on the list for now. So now, we have a theory that Anyone can use an ettmetalmind Any attribute can be stored in an ettmetalmind If anyone has some thoughts on how to improve and refine this theory, or a WoB to back this up or knock it down, or if you just want to say something about it, please reply and say whatever you're going to say.

So we all know that Mistborn Era 4 Scadrial has become a space faring civilisation, and that in Sixth of the Dusk, there is at least one civilisation that has reached this status. Given the sheer versatility of the investiture systems, it is pretty likely that the aliens are in fact Scadrians. That opens up so many questions, but I would like to focus on one specifically: how did they do it? As mentioned before, it is Scadrials magic systems which probably made them the first space civilisation. I believe that it is a combination of Cadmium, Bendalloy, Ettmetal, and Medallions which have allowed them to enter the space frontier. Bendalloy makes speed bubbles, so if you attach one to a spaceship, the math on the wiki page says you would compress 2 minutes of the ship moving at full speed into 15 seconds of actual travel time. The problem with this is that people inside the spaceship will still age, as it is time which is being manipulated. That means that while the spaceship would travel FTL relative to the cosmere, inside the bubble, people would age normally. Essentially, it unpractical space travel and very limited. BUT, if you also create a smaller cadmium bubble around the structure of the ship ( a C.bubble within a B.bubble), we know from this WoB that the effects will cancel out: This means that the crew wouldn't be trapped inside the speed speed bubble, and so will experience time normally. However, to make this technology even more efficient, the Scadrians would put up ANOTHER cadmium bubble within the first cadmium bubble (C.bubble within C.bubble within B.bubble). This would allow them to travel FTL and not feel the time effects at all! Essentially, they would be able to get anywhere in no time. I do believe that Ettmetal will be used in the propulsion of the spacecraft, probably through some nuclear propulsion technology. This is what would take the spacecraft to such high speeds. I don't really know how to explain all the other uses, so here's @hwiles comment pulled from here: As for the medallions their benefits are endless: from breath, to healing, to warmth, to weight (which will probably be useful combined with pushing and pulling in space) and the various other technological impacts. NOTE: I just found out from the coppermind that time bubbles in fact compound if used together. This is crazy, and makes FTL travel much, much easier. A normal speed bubble speeds up time by a factor of 8. Compound this with 10 bubbles and you would be travelling insanely fast. WoB is unclear to me, not sure if will double (8x2) or multiply (8x8). We have no information on Cadmiums factor of change, but we can assume that it will be the same as they cancel, and that it'll also compound. Basically, you can use primer cubes each powered by Bendalloy and Cadmium, structured in specific layers. All the Bendalloy bubbles would need to be outside, and you would need about double the amount of Cadmium bubbles to counteract the Bendalloy bubbles and still create their own time-slowing bubbles. What do you guys think? Any other technology which would make FTL travel feasible or easier for Scadrians? (This is my first theory, so there might be gaps in knowledge. Feel free to point them out).

Does anyone know/have a theory as to when Harmonium was first on Scadrial? Would it have been only after Sazed took up Ruin and Preservation or some stage before that?

Introduction This theory is an attempt at solving several mysteries on Scadrial, most notably: What's with the Ice Death? I have actually posted a version of this theory last year as a comment in another person's Ice Death thread, But recently I've formulated several new arguments and found more evidence, and I want to reorganize my thoughts on the matter. Part I: The Lord Ruler To understand the need for my theory, let us first look at the issue of why the Southern Scadrians were put there by Rashek when he Ascended. Here's what Brandon said back in 2008 regarding them: There is one problem here: If Rashek found a way for people to survive extreme heat without genetic modification, why didn't he just use that method for everyone? Why go through all the hassle of creating the Ashmounts and changing people in the North to adapt to a world of ash when the people he moved to the South did not need those things anyway? In other words, if he was able to keep his genetically-unchanged control group alive, what was the point of his genetic experiments? One possibility that comes to mind is that whatever he did to the Southerners was not scalable planet-wide, meaning that whatever it was, it was only feasible to a limited region on the planet. But then, the same could be said of the Ash World solution. Another possibility is that in the event that Scadrial's orbit is fixed at some point in the future, it was much harder to revert the effects of this non-genetic method. It's very likely that Rashek intended to undo his damage on the world once the Well was refilled. It could be that he found the non-genetic solution (whatever it was) would be harder to undo when that happens, so he decided to use a method on the Northerners that was easier to undo when the orbit is eventually fixed. Except, he wasn't sure the Ash World solution would work long enough, so he still used the non-genetic solution on a select group of people as a "reserve". So we have these clues as to what Rashek did to the Southerners: It was definitely not genetic in nature. It may have been something that could only be applied to the southern continent. It may have effects that are difficult to undo even with Shardic power. Given this, can we figure out what the Southern Solution is? Part II: The Hero of Ages Here is another mystery. When Sazed obtained both Ruin and Preservation at the end of HoA, he used the knowledge of Scadrial's religions to both return the planet to its previous orbit, rearrange the continents back to their previous locations, and fix the genetic modifications that Rashek made to the Northerners: Afterwards, Sazed created the Elendel Basin, a fertile area where food and water was always plentiful and the climate was temperate, for the people of the North to live on. He also gave the Northerners copies of the contents of his Copperminds, and gave them hints regarding the Allomantic metals they haven't discovered yet. As he said in SoS, he made it very easy for his own people to live in the newly restored planet. Too easy: And that was our first hint of the troubles faced by the Southerners. In BoM we would learn that somehow, even after Sazed fixed the continents, the Southern Scadrians still experienced a climate catastrophe, the Ice Death, that would freeze many of them to death. Here's the mystery: Why didn't Sazed put as much effort in making the Southerners as comfortable and happy as the Northerners when he Ascended? Did he not care for them? Is Sazed racist? That doesn't sound like the wise and compassionate Terrisman that we know. Besides, we know for certain that the Southerners have a huge advantage over the Northerners: ettmetal. Or as Sazed apparently prefers to call it, harmonium. That's the god metal of Sazed, right? The god metal of Harmony. And it's all for the Southerners to exploit and use (once they figure it out). Why give harmonium to the South, when he can't even be bothered to remove the Ice Death phenomenon? Part III: The Sovereign Well, we do know someone who did bother to do something about it: Kelsier, who was known as the Sovereign in the South. Perhaps Harmony sent him there, but it's still weird how the god who directly created the blessed Elendel Basin could not directly solve the Ice Death problem. Anyway, Kelsier went there, taught the Southerners about the Metallic Arts, found a way to harness the Arts to create the medallions that the Southerners used to survive the intense coldness that they felt, and taught them how ettmetal can be used to harness Allomancy and Feruchemy. That's great and all, but there's still one problem: When Kelsier went to the South, it wasn't frozen at all. This is obviously not polar weather. There wasn't even any snow. Obviously Sazed succeeded in moving the southern continent towards a more temperate region of the planet, its original location pre-Rashek. Now, it's possible for people to experience hypothermia even in warmer climates. but one would think that the Southern Scadrians would have learned to adapt to the cold twelve years after it started. As someone who lives in a tropical country, I know full well how unpleasant it is to be suddenly faced with what people from temperate regions call "mildly cold weather", but every single person I know who's moved from my country to a non-tropical one managed to adapt to the new climate eventually. But that's not what happened to the Southern Scadrians. For more than a decade their population slowly dwindled as one by one people died from a coldness that they should have been used to at that point. And even after hundreds of years in that environment, they still depended on the Heat medallions, as proven by Allik needing to wrap thick blankets around himself just to ward off the coldness he felt in his prison at Dulsing. So, again, we go back to our previous question: Why didn't Sazed do anything? If the coldness that Southerners felt was merely biological, then Sazed could have restored them when he restored the Northerners. But we know it was not biological, because we've already established that Rashek did not touch their genes. I saw someone speculate that the constant use of Heat Feruchemy via the Heat medallions has been changing the Spiritual aspect of the Southern Scadrians, such that they now perceive heat differently than normal. That is an interesting idea, but suffice to say it can't be Kelsier's fault that the Southerners can't adapt to the heat, because they already couldn't adapt years before he taught them about the medallions. In other words, they've been perceiving heat abnormally before the Sovereign. But maybe Heat Feruchemy does have something to do with it... Part IV: The Jaggenmire A lot of people believe that since the term "harmonium" was coined by Sazed, the element could not have existed prior to his Ascension. I don't think that's necessarily true. The combination of Ruin and Preservation's powers has been happening long before Sazed was born. The very planet itself is Connected to both Shards, and the hybrid Metallic Art of Feruchemy (of which Sazed was a practitioner) is a testament that the two powers are complementary. The fact that Southern Scadrians have their own name for it could be a clue. Brandon used the term "ettmetal", likely from the Swedish word "ett", meaning "one", perhaps as a clue that the Southern Scadrians linked the metal to the Jaggenmire, the mysterious "two persons in one god" (a duonity?) concept that is the basis of their religion. "They were always one", said Allik. "And Always apart." Atium has always been different from lerasium, but perhaps there also has always been the One Metal that is both of them. Perhaps this is why Sazed doesn't like "sazedium" as an alternative name for ettmetal. It's not his modesty--at least, not just his modesty-- but rather his sense of truth. He does not want to name the metal after himself, the Vessel, because the metal was not his direct responsibility. Rather, he calls it "harmonium", because long before his time, long before even Rashek, the powers of Ruin and Preservation created the planet by harmoniously balancing their natures, as Herr and Frue were said to have done. Conclusion: The Lord Ruler Revisited Let me now put all those ideas together into a single theory. I believe that Sazed could not fix the Ice Death directly because its cause was very, very difficult to undo, even for a Shard. I believe the reason for the Ice Death is directly connected to what Rashek did to the Southerners to protect them from the extreme heat of the sun. And I believe it has something to do with ettmetal. So, how did Rashek use ettmetal, assuming it did exist during his time? Simple: In his Ascended state, he touched all the native ettmetal ores within the Southern continent and primed it with Feruchemical Heat storage. This allowed the whole continent to be colder than it should be, keeping temperatures at very comfortable levels for the population there. It's possible that all the ettmetal in the planet was concentrated in that continent, just as all the atium and all the lerasium can be found only in the North, in special areas connected to the Shards. In which case, this solution could only be implemented in the South. Rashek knew that a thousand years of region-wide Kinetic Investiture would affect those Connected to the region, similar to how the regional Investiture of Sel works, and somehow he knew that this effect on the Southern peoples could not be reverted easily. He knew exactly what would happen to the Southerners once the orbit is brought back to normal. Rashek foresaw the Ice Death, and found it an acceptable burden for a mere "reserve" to potentially bear. P.S. All this, of course, is just speculation on my part. Feel free to share your thoughts and offer constructive criticism.