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I believe that everyone who's read the most recent (tenth) chapter of RoW has one question burning in their minds: What is going to happen to Kaladin? Today, I have the answer to that question. (Slightly less crackpot part of the theory) Most people seem to agree that the obvious next step in Kaladin's journey is the fourth ideal. However, I see a problem with this: Kaladin is dealing with more than one problem. Kaladin always feels an urge to protect everyone, even other Windrunners. This has caused a lot of what we see in the early chapters of RoW, and Kaladin references it when Dalinar suggests he help train Windrunners, saying that sending them off to possibly die would tear him apart. However, this is not the only problem. When Moash confronts Kaladin, he tries to hurt him by telling him that everyone will die, and that Kaladin cannot save them all. Kaladin is bogged down by the guilt of all the people he has failed to save, and simply ceasing to hold himself responsible for people who can protect themselves is not going to end that guilt, and Kaladin will not be able to recover fully. An obvious ideal to deal with both of these problems would be something along the lines of: "I will forgive myself for failing to protect" but that would be seemingly contradictory to a Windrunner's gem archive statement in OB, "Aren't I supposed to want to protect people?" (I paraphrased that). So in conclusion, in order to make more than a , either Kaladin needs to say both the fourth and fifth ideals, or Brandon has thought of a fourth ideal that solves both of Kaladin's problems, fits with the gem archive, and leaves room for further character development. (On to the crackpot part) So, everyone who's read the tenth chapter of RoW knows that it ends on a downer, and anyone who's in Brandon's newsletter knows that there is a Syl interlude (Spoilers ahead) during which (last warning) Kaladin is still depressed, and it is uncertain whether he has chosen a new job yet. Here is my theory: the Syl interlude is the end of Kaladin for the rest of the series. Kaladin fades away into a background character, perhaps appearing a few more times, maybe even swearing the fourth ideal, only to find it is not enough. Kaladin will even go so far as to change his name, and we will not even know who he is. We will have so much nothing from Kaladin that everyone but his most ardent fans move on. Then, in the back half, near the end of the second Stormlight, some random person will say the fifth ideal of the Windrunners and save the day in awesome fashion, revealing the one person whom we never would have considered as a possible Kaladin (and there will have been many), to be the real Kaladin. (Either that or Kaladin will swear both the fourth and fifth ideals almost simultaneously in RoW, even odds I'd say).
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