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  1. Apologies if this is an old idea - it's new to me! I just read a theory on Reddit discussing how Taravangian was set up to be Dalinar's foil, and how well that fits with him taking up Odium and Dalinar seemingly being on a path towards reclaiming Honor (or something like that, at least). We know that Cultivation had a hand in both Taravangian's Ascension and Dalinar's journey, by interacting with them both directly when they visited the Nightwatcher. We also know of one other person who interacted with Cultivation directly - Lift. My theory is that Cultivation, in addition to preparing Taravangian to take up Odium (confirmed) and Dalinar to take up Honor (suspected), is also preparing Lift to be her own successor. Evidence in favour of this, in addition to the above pattern, that I can think of off the top of my head: Lift's character so far is based very strongly on the idea of not changing, which is more or less the antithesis of Cultivation's Intent. As we've seen, she is changing despite her best efforts and pleas to Cultivation. This seems to set the stage very nicely for an interesting character arc. She has bonded a Cultivationspren. She can metabolise food directly into Lifelight - Cultivation's light. There might be more, or I could be completely wrong. But I found it interesting to think about nevertheless, and I hope you do too!
  2. Hi friends, I am new to the 17th Shard and this is my first post here. Now what I am about to discuss here is not entirely my theory, most of it has been theorized by the fandom for quite some time now. I am just gathering the most probable ones together and see if it fits to form a mostly cohesive narrative. Spoiler Alert for all of Stormlight Archive, including the chapter of Wind and Truth released by Brandon. So, with that complete I am going to discuss the possible ending of Stormlight 5 and maybe some plot points that can be expected in the back half. Now there are dozens of characters in the Stormlight Archive each having their own compelling stories, but predicting the ending for each of them is impossible. So I will be focusing on just 4 characters, the 4 most important characters to the narrative of Stormlight Archive, the 4 characters who started it all: Kaladin, Shallan, Dalinar and Szeth. Yeah, Brandon pretty much says they are the key. So, let's examine their paths and come to a conclusion for each of them. I think that will give us a pretty good idea of where Book 5 will end. Shallan So, Shallan. Her story is basically finding out who she is, confronting it and accepting it. Pattern said that Lightweavers don’t have oaths, but they have truths. This is because of their unique position as spies. Knowing their truths will keep them grounded, since they impersonate other people there is a possibility that they may get lost in the role they are playing so they must know who they are. This is why Adolin was the right choice for Shallan and not Kaladin. Adolin knew which one was the real Shallan, the woman he loves. So far Shallan has spoken 3 truths: She killed her father, She killed her mother, She killed her spren. With the third truth Veil merged with Shallan and only Radiant is left. So, the next truth will be the one where she and Radiant merge and it will happen in Wind and Truth. One of the biggest Chekhov's guns that Brandon planted but never used in his the series so far is that Kaladin is the one who killed Helaran. And this is her reaction when she learns of it. Yeah, she suppressed it. I am not suggesting that she is going to fight Kaladin in book 5 because of this, quite the opposite really. And it comes down to Shallan’s mother, the herald Chanarach. Yes I believe Chanarach is Shallan’s mom especially after the release of Book 5 Prologue. Again it is not my theory but it is already there. The basic premise is, Chanarach has red hair just like Shallan and she had connections to the Skybreakers and tried to kill Shallan because she was a radiant. We also know that Taln didn’t break and this theory explains that too. In the book 5 prologue we learn that one of the heralds died on the day of Gavilar’s feast, which happened six years before the Way of Kings, exactly the same time period when Shallan killed her mother. She killed her mother Chanarach and sent her to braize. Chanarach endured the torture for 6 years before breaking. So, Taln didn’t break. This will be Shallan’s final truth. She is the one who is (indirectly) responsible for the desolation. And I don’t think Shallan will be able to ignore or suppress the truth that she pretty much caused the end of the world. I think at this moment of shame all her suppressed emotions will come out including her brother’s death. Then there is Chanarach herself, who will not be happy to learn that her eldest son was killed by Kaladin. This is my theory, Chanarach will confront Kaladin over Helaran’s death and try to kill him. At the same time, despite knowing that Kaladin killed her favorite brother, Shallan will choose to help Kaladin by fighting her own mother whom she very much still loves. Choosing Honor over revenge and her mother. Shallan will merge with Radiant and become a fully realized Lightweaver and possibly even revive Testament. Shallan will also survive Book 5, and go on to transform her Lightweaver Radiants into a cosmere wide spy network with the help of Hoid (who is also a Lightweaver) in order to fight the Ghostbloods. Dalinar Dalinar is the one on whom I am most conflicted. I mean his character arc pretty much came to a conclusion in Oathbringer with the You cannot have my Pain moment. There is really nothing much to develop in Dalinar except for the Duel he has with Odium. Now, Taravodium is not that different from Raysodium. So, Taravodium wants to rule over the entire cosmere and he thinks he will do a better job than the current shards. So, what he wants is simple, to be free of the Rosharan system, while also maintaining some control over it. So what is the way for Taravodium to get what he wants? Brandon has removed Rayse and introduced Taravangian as Odium because Rayse doesn’t have that fear factor anymore. So I think Taravangian will get what he wants. So Dalinar will somehow end up breaking the contract. It wont turn the Stormfather into deadeyes but it will let Odium to corrupt the Stormfather, potentially ending his ability to supply Stormlight. Szeth Szeth’s character is all about finding the truth himself. First he followed his religion blindly, then he followed Nale blindly and now he is following Dalinar blindly. His character arc is to break free of this and learn to distinguish right from wrong by himself. To learn what is the truth without blindly following others. Szeth’s fourth Ideal is ‘I will cleanse the Shin of their false leaders, so long as Dalinar Kholin agrees.’ And he will complete that successfully. But it won’t be the end for Szeth, by the end of book five he will be a 5th Ideal radiant. This is what Nale says regarding the fifth Ideal So imagine, Szeth completes his 4th ideal and returns to Urithiru, to Dalinar and what does he see? Dalinar has broken the contract, the law. Szeth will be forced to confront the reality that Dalinar was wrong and following him is not the right way. This is when he rises higher and swears his fifth ideal, becoming his own man. After that Szeth will kill Dalinar, thus stopping Odium’s corruption on the Stormfather from getting much worse. Since he would be using Nightblood to kill Dalinar this might even sever his bond to Stormfather and Honor. Odium will then transform Dalinar’s cognitive shadow into a Fused. Kaladin Well if there is one thing I am certain about our sad depressed bridgeboy, it is that he will live. The entire point of Kaladin’s character arc is that no matter how good and powerful he becomes there will always be those he cannot save, and he has to learn to live with it. And Kaladin finally achieved that in RoW, so killing him off in Winds and Truth even if it was a heroic self sacrifice will not be satisfying. Also he is being set up as a therapist for the Heralds. So, what do I think will happen with him? Well, he will Ascend to honor. There are many references to this in the books. Kaladin’s very first POV chapter is named “Honor is Dead”. Then there is that moment in WoR where he says, “Honor is dead, but I’ll see what I can do.” Brandon pretty much said that Kaladin never felt the Thrill because of Syl, but he was not bonded to Syl in Amaram’s army. Syl seems to remember Kaladin’s childhood despite not being bonded to him at that time. His connection to Aesudan as he recognizes the tune she is singing. He is also related to her by blood for some reason. In Oathbringer Kaladin killed, like actually killed a corrupted spren using Syl. The corrupted spren died like Phendorana. Then in both Oathbringer and RoW he commanded the Windspren to blow back the storm itself and they did it. Honestly there is so much more to Kaladin that is very similar to Vin from Mistborn. There is the Child of Tanavast. Overall? So what is it that I am trying to say? Well the Duel of the Champions will not be the final act of the book. It will probably happen at the end of Part 3. The true final act, the Sanderlanch will not be at Urithiru or Shinovar, it will be at the Shattered Plains. There a loophole in the treaty So after the Duel, there will be a final battle between the Radiants and the forces of Odium at the shattered plains. It will probably be for Ba-Ado-Mishram, each racing against time to get her for themselves. Only the Radiants will be low on morale and Stormlight due to Dalinar’s loss. They will be losing against the forces of Odium when the Singers led by Venli and Rlain join the battle to help the Radiants. Oh, and they will probably be riding on Chasmfiends as in RoW we saw them controlling one at the end. It is after this Kaladin will ascend, and by this point I think he would have lost Syl. Syl would be alive, but he would have lost his bond with her. I think Ishar would have brought Syl into the physical realm by this point. So how will Kaladin ascend? This is what Hoid told Kaladin in one of the SA 5 chapters released by Brandon What I think will happen is, during the battle Kaladin will play the Flute, and he will play the Rhythm of Honor. Just like how Navani produces Towerlight from a Rhythm, Kaladin will produce Stormlight with the Rhythm of Honor. This coupled with his near deity-like status in Urithiru among the Radiants and the recently forged alliance between Men and Singers will help Kaladin reassemble the Splintered Shard of Honor and Ascend. Maybe he might have help form Ba-Ado-Mishram, or Hoid, or Cultivation or even Dalinar. This will give the edge the Radiants need to defeat Odium’s forces. Szeth will probably fight and then convince Nale to rejoin the side of the Radiants, thus bringing the Order of Skybreakers back to Honor. Moash will have his redemption journey and will take Jezrien’s place as a herald. I am not sure exactly how this will happen but I am confident Moash is on a redemption path. Once the battle is won, Kaladin as Honor will reform the Oathpact and seal away the Fused. Only this time he will go to Braize along with all the Heralds. His presence will allow the Heralds to fight back against the Fused and give Kaladin enough space and time to perform Mental Therapy on them. The back half of the books will deal with the scarcity of Stormlight, the Men who have bonded Odium’s spren like Aesudan, The introduction of Lifelight through Lift. A shadowy war with the Ghostbloods over Investiture. Now although Odium is free from the Rosharan System, he has also pretty much lost control over Roshar and the Fused. So he will return in the end back half for a Final Confrontation. This is when Kaladin and the Heralds return from Braize. By the end of Book 10 Dalinar will break free of Odium. Since there are so many Corrupted spren and unmades like Sja-anat who go against Odium, perhaps by the end of Book 10 Kaladin will splinter Odium and take it up himself and become War. After all, Kaladin is described as a passionate man many times. This will set the stage for an overall cosmere wide conflict. Harmony vs War vs Autonomy vs Endowment etc…
  3. My theory is based on three key pieces of information from Sunlit man and TLM. 1. Kaladin is alive in some way but is not meant to be anywhere else (on Roshar presumably) 2. Something bad is happening on Roshar, presumably a war(which would have ended if Dalinar won the battle of champions) that keeps it difficult to interact or gain support from. 3. Something important is in Shinovar and Cultivation is planning something big Now to explain, on revision and reading through the various books set after the events of Stormlight 5 that there still is some kind of conflict on Roshar thats keeping it preoccupied with itself and makes it dangerous. We also know that something BIG happens to Kaladin to make it impossible for Kaladin to not be on Canticle (planet its set on) and is implied to still be alive (although he possibly can just be dead, but I feel like Brandon is setting him up for something more, although it could be a martyr) From this we can assume that in both the Journey to Shinovar and the Duel that they don't go as planned and effect the plot in major and unseen ways that are hinted at. One of these ways is that Dalinar will lose, as this not only would allow for the war to continue to but also cause Dalinar to be forced onto Taravangians side. While this could simply end there and the majority of the book is set as Dalinar trying to resist and maintain his oaths which eventually leads to him swearing another oath which allows him to break free or fail again, I think something greater will happen. I think Dalinar will swear his oaths and once Odium is by his side and someone else or someone figures out how to reforge honor, Dalinar will force Odium to bond with Honor of which I think he was meant to all along due to his condition. Being a person of two minds. Emotion and logic, Odium and Honor. Giving him the ability to utilize both shards intent properly something that Sazed struggles with himself while maintaining the ability to act and moniter each of the shards properly, each being a foil of the other while still allowing agency. Then I think over the course of the book Cultivation(before this event) will interact with and sort of act as a mentor to Todium in his shard ways, but when he becomes Twinshards like Cultivation wanted, he instead turns on her and Roshar once again splits into multiple sides, this time being Cultivation vs TodiumHonor vs those who remain. I think this also contributes to what Kaladin does as I think that in Shinovar that Kaladin gains or learns something about the shards and eventually(with some knights like Shallan and Adolin who will probably revive his blade) make a new independant faction for the knights that deny the shards and fight for the people of Roshar instead of anyone else and I think might gain some power that puts them on the same stage as the others, possibly a Dawnshard? I think that Dalinar will also take some knights to join Todium as well. probably due to the pact. But I think that most of the spren(at least the Windrunner and Edgedancer orders) will deny Todium and his goals as well as Cultivation(possibly) and make their own faction with Kaladin. Either way I feel like there will be three factions. I do know that Venli and her Willshapers will act as a strange but important piece in this though. But tell me what you think and definitely give me all of the criticism and ideas you have as well!!
  4. So I think that at some point the stormfather will absorb the rest of Honor and will stay bonded to Dalinar I think he will then make him a splinter/ Avatar of Honor and use their bond to empower him to do Shard like stuff and to have a connection to the Physical Realm and allowing him to do some interesting things What are these interesting things? no idea but I think it would be cool. Any theories? and also I know this not is very likely, feel free to tear this Theory apart
  5. This whole theory stems from my desire to redeem Tanavast. Because, even if what the rest of the heralds did to Taln was cruel, I can understand them. They were broken after thousands of years of torture. For Tanavast to not do something to help abandoned Taln is beyond evil. And I think he did something, something noble and stupid. Up until recently, I assumed Honor's death was a consequence of trapping Odium in the Rosharan system. But the timeline doesn’t work. Odium is trapped on Roshar for at least 4500 years. And that is a minimum. It may be even before humans came on Roshar. There is no evidence that he is not trapped when he manipulated Ishar on Ashyn. And that many years is slightly pushing the term ‘slow death’ of the shard. I think something happened between Aharietiam and Recreance that directly led to Honor’s death. First, I need to make a huge assumption. The Oathpact needs 10 people not only to share the pain of torture but to protect them from ‘magical’ insanity. The assumption is that if the heralds hadn’t abandoned Oathpact, they would still be broken people, but without that ‘magical’ madness. So the theory is that Tanavast as the vessel joined the Oathpact alongside Taln. Or at least shared his pain of torture. But only two of them weren’t enough. Over time they both went mad (hence Honor’s ravings during the Recrenesance). That made the vessel of the shard weak and open to attack from Odium. Connection to Taln also made Tanavast partly connected to Braise. As a bonus, it can explain why Odium was suspiciously inactive after Aharietiam. Why hasn’t he done the same thing the Mishram did – ignore the trapped fused and provide singers with the forms of power? It is better than nothing. And he can’t be trapped as BAM was. Tanavast actions bound Odium to the Oathpact and trapped him on Braise after Aharietiam.
  6. I'd been rereading the stormlight archives and the concept of 2 deaths (physical and when something is forgotten) mad me think that maybe since Honor hasn't experienced a second death(people still remember him) he can somehow be revived using shadesmar. What are your thoughts?
  7. Contains spoilers for anything from Oathbringer and before: Hello everyone I just want to say that I am brand new to this forum and still haven’t finished Oathbringer, so if I get anything wrong then that’s why haha. Anyways, I was curious on what exactly Spren are and how they came to be. So I know that the Spren are supposed to be the embodiment of people‘a conception of certain things, but they are also splinters of Honor, killed by Odium. So they are splinters, but it says on the Coppermind wiki that Spren existed before humans even came to Roshar, so did Honor die during the time of the Dawnsingers? Or did he still exist, and if so, then how are Spren splinters of Honor if Honor wasn’t dead at the time? Did Honor create the splinters himself??
  8. A question often posed is why heralds refuse to wear shardplate. I think I've found the answer. We see how shardplate is resistant to surge and void binding. This is because as a god metal, it is so saturated with investiture as to resist other forms of investiture. Interestingly it also blocks other forms of investiture, such as emotional allomancy. We've known for a while that heralds did not need to carry gemstones, which is presumable because honor is channeling investiture into their bodies through their honorblade bond, similar to how bondsmiths "Create" powerlight So heralds don't wear plate so that they can receive investiture directly from honor(placed presumably in the sky) Additionally, it might actually kill them. We see from Jezrien that heralds die rapidly when their soul is separated from the physical world. Theirfore this level of investiture insulation could slowly starve a herald of their divine essence
  9. Listening through RoW for the second time, I’m given to wonder: are Shards coming back together? We know that Stormlight and Voidlight mix into Warlight. Will the Shards themselves come together? And would peace be achieved by creating a combined Shard of War? Dalinar, as the Bondsmith of the Stormfather, seems to have as much power as can be had that once belonged to Honor. If the Storms merged, or perhaps if Dalinar loses the contest of Champions, but Odium goes down anyway…. Could Dalinar become War? Part of me thinks that this might be a step backwards for Dalinar. Part of me thinks it would be kinda lame for Brandon to do the exact same thing on Roshar as he did on Scadrial…… but maybe the Shards are coming together. They were never meant to be separate. Maybe Dalinar’s next big challenge is to fail in his contest and fall back into war, and claw his way into something better. And then there’s a question of what kind of Shard War would be. Hatred, restricted by oaths and discipline? Battle, but organized, with rules of engagement, Codes that control violence? Battle being handled by soldiers so that civilians are left in peace? I don’t know…..
  10. How connected were Spren to Honor? In general I view them as functionally separate. I do wonder about the economies of scale of this assumption however. Would an event like the recreance be directly felt by, or be able to directly hurt Honor?
  11. I looked online to see if anyone talked about this, and i didn’t find anything so I guess I’ll make a post. as some may know, I’m a believer that stormlight isn’t a book of the end of the world, but is in fact a book about the revival of the world, as in the following post talking about mistborn and stormlights differences. So in holding to this, I have a theory for book 5 but first some background to the thoughts. I believe in oathbringer the stormfather mention that odium rides the storm like honor used to, and what do we know about odium riding storms? He’s able to protect his army and ships while destroying others in his path. what if honor did the same thing. The stormfather said that honor loved humans. That he protected and died for them. What if he literally protected them from the storms when he was alive. shielding them and their cities from the full force of the storm. Kinda like what kaladin has done a couple of times. The bases of the theory come from one of the visions Dalinar gets when the midnight essence was released, the people lived in wooden houses, and was confused about why Dalinar was mentioning living in caves and in stone buildings. That must be because there is no need to worry about the storms, their god honor literally protects them. Also a legend, of karbronth. Called the city of bells. Saying they would hang bells outside to tell if a highstorm was even happening. Laughed at but maybe it holds more weight then we originally thought. and I think we are starting to see the stormfather change slightly, where he now considers the request of kaladin and of Dalinar.(why would he consider it if he couldn’t do the request?) To where in RoW when arguing with Dalinar he mentions how the two people didn’t survive due to a boulder hitting them. Dissipate just mentions how he only sees the front of the storm. (Stormfather is a filthy lier) what’s yalls thoughts? TLDR: I believe that the storms didn’t hurt people when Honor was alive. And that the stormfather might return to that state becoming a storm that cares.
  12. This is a theory I've been chewing on for a while but haven't wanted to post because I haven't had the time to put all the pieces together. Anyway, here goes: SPOILERS THROUGH RHYTHM OF WAR (I think) TLDR Ba Ado Mishram was the child of Honor and Cultivation, the common ground between singers and spren. The Heralds communed with her to some degree, perhaps tricking or trading with her, and she helped them access the Surges. This violated the agreement between the human refugees that bound them in Shinovar and forbade them to use the Surges (in the eyes of the singers at least) - and was the initial spren betrayal the Fused speak of. In retaliation, the singers went to Odium and became the Fused, sparking the first Desolation. The Heralds went to Honor and forged the Oathpact to enable them to fight the Fused and seal them in Braize. In the course of the war, the Fused were able to help Odium Unmake Mishram into Ba Ado Mishram. This is the singer betrayal the spren speak of, which led to many spren mimicing what Honor had done with the Heralds, and the beginning of the Radiants. Cultivation and Honor then had another child, this time made to represent the common ground between humans and spren - Mishram's younger Sibling. A lot of the evidence I've based this on from the text is drawn from the two in-world myths in the title, 'Queen Tsa and the cleverest of the three moons' and 'The Girl Who Looked Up". If you want to get into the weeds, keep reading. Myths of Roshar Firstly, we need to be establish the connection between these two tales, so let's look at what both of the myths are about: The tale of Queen Tsa is a story about a woman who escapes the bounds set forth for her and her people by travelling to the heavens. She is aware that going to the heavens is forbidden for mortals, but still she ascends (by tricking the green moon Mishim to trade places with her). She eventually returns to the world, however she is carrying the child of Nomon, the blue moon god of her people. Her son bears the "mantle of the heavens" and she believes he will lead her people to glory. The tale of The Girl Who Looked Up is a story about a young woman who escapes the bounds set forth for her and her people by travelling beyond the Wall. She is aware that going beyond the Wall is forbidden for her people, but still she ascends. She looks over the wall to and sees God's Light. She returns to the world, but first she steals a piece of God's Own Light and flees back home with it. As a result, the storms start coming - but her people now have Light. My conclusion is probably quite obvious by now... Queen Tsa is The Girl Who Looked Up Or, at least, the two represent the same person/people. While Queen Tsa may be an actual historical figure in Roshar, it's important to remember that Hoid - ancient, magical Hoid - is the one telling the tale.. And he's not above exercising artistic license when he wants to. Hoid is also the teller of the second iteration of the Girl Who Looked Up not long after this scene, the version which includes the Girl's people having "light renewed." (Oathbringer, 82) If that doesn't convince you, here are a few of the symbolic ties between Tsa and the Girl. i) Looking Up Like the Girl, Tsa quite literally spends her story looking up at the heavens and hatching her scheme to get there: she is literally a girl who looks up. Both Tsa and the Girl are warned against their quest: The Queen herself says that all know the eyes of mortals would burn at the sights, their minds run mad at the language of the heavens. The Girl questions several people on the Wall and is told: "There is a wall. Do not go beyond it, or you shall die.” (Oathbringer, 25) Both the Girl and the Queen reach for the sky: The Girl by climbing the "high, terrible wall stretching toward the moons. Blocking the sky..." (Oathbringer, 25) The Queen by designing "high towers for her city, built to reach ever upward, grasping toward the sky." (Oathbringer, 67) ii) Turning White In the myth of the Girl at the point at which she starts climbing the Wall, Shallan notices that the Girl's hair is white, and is unsure if it had always been. Brandon has stated there is some significance to this. In the story of Tsa, the Queen is represented in Hoid's smoke by a white tower while Mishim is represented by a green moon. Once they trade places however, Shallan notes that: "the moon had become white, and the single straight tower he made by swiping up in the smoke was instead pale green." (Oathbringer, 67) In both stories, the transition/appearance of white occurs after the protagonist sets out on their journey to the other side. iii) The Red Scarf In the myth of the Girl, we are told: "a vibrant red scarf grew around the girl’s neck, twin tails extending far behind her". (Oathbringer, 25) The significance of this scarf is hard to see until you look into the history of the scarf itself. It originated in Ancient Egypt and was worn by Queen Nefertiti. I think this is meant to draw yet another symbolic connection between the Girl and Queen Tsa, as she too wears the mantle of a Queen. As for the colour red, more on that later.* Lastly, when Shallan finds Hoid telling the story of Queen Tsa and the three moons in Kholinar: "He was dressed, strangely, in a soldier’s uniform—Sadeas’s livery, with the coat unbuttoned and a colored scarf around his neck." (Oathbringer, 67) iv) The Crime Both the Girl and the Queen commit a crime (or at least something that is viewed in world as morally wrong) once they reach the other side. The Queen breaks her promise not to look upon the sights of the heavens: "Tsa! Your word is broken!" (Oathbringer, 67) The Girl steals a piece of God's Light. v) The Light Both return home with a keepsake from the other side. The Girl returns to her village with the piece of God's Light, bringing with her the storms. We are told that the Light once taken could not be put back and that "each storm brought light renewed" and [of her people] "now they could see". In other words, her people now had Light eternal thanks to her gambit. The Queen carries a child of Nomon, one of the gods, who bears the "mantle of the heavens". The story elaborates that all descendants of this son bear this mantle (the blue skin) - or you could say all of her people now bear the mantle of the heavens. Symbolically, heaven's mantle usually refers to the stars themselves - or starlight. So all of her people now bear the Light of the heavens after her gambit. So if these two stories are about the same characters and events, what are they about? Who do they represent? We know of the history of the human refugees led by the Heralds, who were bound in Shinovar and likely warned against tampering with the Surges after the destruction of their home planet. We know that the First Desolation was sparked by some sort of betrayal by the spren involving the humans: "The betrayal of spren has brought us here/They gave their Surges to human heirs" (Words of Radiance, 28) Who is Queen Tsa/The Girl representing? What about Mishim, God's Light, the child of Nomon and Tsa? The Heralds & Ba Ado Mishram 1) The people of Tsa's kingdom = the people of the village = human refugees from Ashyn The Village and the world are both the strictly designated areas of the denizens of Tsa and the Girl's world, and they are forbidden to leave it. From what we know of the original Ashynite refugees, this is exactly what Shinovar was to them: humans were supposed to stay in the grassy, earth-like area designed for them - to this day the Shin curse stonewalkers ( the rest of Roshar is basically stone and crem). Another parallel is found in the fact that the people in the Girl's village lived in darkness - there was no Light. In much the same way, Shinovar is known to have no spren, and the ancient human refugees had no bonds to Rosharan spren - no Investiture - no Light. However, this story is not purely a physical one - much like the history of Roshar was not. 2) The City/World = The Village = Shinovar/the minds of men Queen Tsa's home city/the whole world parallels the village the girl lives in: the Village is described as being in the shadow of the great Wall - one villager says it's not a wall: "That’s just the way the sky is over there.” (Oathbringer, 25) The Wall is so huge the villagers almost seem to live beneath it, in the same way Tsa and her people live literally below the heavens. And while the humans did literally expand out of Shinovar into Roshar, but the rest of the tale - the theft of Light, the mantle of the heavens - doesn't quite add up with any purely physical objects in Rosharan history. We have known since Words of Radiance that the ancient singers felt the spren had betrayed them. This has been expanded on in subsequent books as we know the singers manipulated the Surges - using Stoneshaping etc. - and had some sort of bonds with the spren like all native Rosharan life. That ancient betrayal that sparked the war, and a cycle of betrayals. The spren betrayal, in the listener's words was that: "They gave their Surges to human heirs" (Words of Radiance, 28) We also know how spren bonds work now - human minds are linked to spren, which pulls them into the Physical Realm through the Connection. It is a meeting of minds that grants spren presence in the Physical Realm in exchange for granting humans Surges. This is why I believe the darkness the people of the Girl's village is representative of Cognitive darkness - the humans had no access to the Surges, to Stormlight - they lived in darkness. For further evidence we can look to the singers in this tale. 3) The creatures who lived beyond the Wall = the singers "She climbed down the steps...she hid among the creatures who lived on this side." (Oathbringer, 82) There are creatures who live beyond the wall, in "God's Light" (Oathbringer, 82) unlike the Girl's people living in the land of shadows. On the Physical level, this is accurate with what we know of Rosharan history - the ancient singers lived in Roshar, filled with spren and Investiture while the humans lived in earth-like Shinovar. It also tallies with what we've heard about the bonds between men and spren vs those between singers and spren.These realms are meant to represent the minds of men and singers respectively: at this point in time, humans had no Connection to the spren of Roshar - there was a barrier between their minds and those of the spren. Singers however, cannot provide what the humans can: The spren betrayed us, it's often felt. Our minds are too close to their realm That gives us our forms, but more is then Demanded by the smartest spren, We can't provide what the humans lend, Though broth are we, their meat is men (Words of Radiance, 32) According to this, the ancient spren betrayed the singers because singers minds were too close to their realm (Shadesmar), and the sapient spren desired more: human connection. Much as we are told that Mishim "doesn’t want to be in the sky" and longs to come down among mortals and do all the things "she had watched from afar" (Oathbringer, 67). As for Nomon, in the tale we see how Mishim's brothers enjoy the company of Tsa, in a way they never seemed to with Mishim. This seems to parallel the sentiments of the singers as they realise the humans - like Queen Tsa - have more to offer the spren than they do; this suggests Nomon himself represents the spren. As for Mishim...more on that later/ 4) Queen Tsa = The Girl Who Looked Up = The Heralds Now, if the setting is ancient Shinovar then while the Girl/Queen of the people could represent an actual queen, she more likely represents the leaders of the humans living in Shinovar: the Heralds. After all, it is the Girl who is responsible for stealing the piece of God's Light, the coming of the storms, and "tearing down the wall" (Oathbringer, 25). In the RoW Nale visions, we see what is presumably the forging of the Oathpact (as it is the earliest vision). In it, Jezrien and Ishar invite Nale to take some charge, a duty that he accepts with honor - the Oathpact. Jezrien claims, "We will fix what we've broken." (Rhythm of War, 47) This seems to indicate that Jezrien and Ishar - at least - were responsible for starting the Desolations. We also infer that Nale was opposed to whatever Jezrien and Ishar did that "broke" something and started the war, as Jezrien claims he was correct all along. Let's combine this with what we already know about the start of the Desolations: 1) The spren betrayed the singers by giving their "Surges to human heirs" 2) The humans betrayed the singers in some way involving the spren "they were a people forlorn, without a home...their betrayal extended even to our gods: to spren, stone, and wind." (Oathbringer, 111) 3) Some of the Heralds were responsible for breaking something, which started the Desolations So what did the ancient humans break? We know the Heralds were their leaders, and that squares with Jezrien's reference to what they broke when talking to Nale. In the story of the Girl, she steals a piece of God's Light. This leads to the breaking of the wall, the barrier between the land of shadows and the land of Light - and the Storms come as a punishment. It seems that the Heralds - the ancient humans - violated their agreement, they broke their word. "Tsa! Your word is broken!" (Oathbringer, 67) The Heralds broke their word by (in the eyes of the Fused) stealing the spren/Surges, breaking the barrier between men and spren and, which led to the Desolations. The Girl crossed the barrier between lands and stole Light, which led to the Wall being torn down and the Storms coming as punishment. After breaking their Pact with the singers, Jezrien and Ishar hatched a plan to forge a new one that might fix what they had ruined.= 5) The Sky = Beyond the Wall = Roshar/Shadesmar It follows that the Heavens and the land beyond the Wall are one and the same. The land beyond the Wall is illuminated by God's Light, which seems to tally with the heavens which are lit by starlight - and also the presence of the gods Nomon and Salas. 6) Tsa & Nomon's Child = The Piece of God's Light = Surges Both the Girl and the Queen journey to the 'Other Side' and return with something: the Girl steals a piece of God's Light, which she brings to her people providing Light eternal - "each storm brought light renewed, for it could never be put back, now that it had been taken." (Oathbringer, 82) The Queen returns to her land pregnant with Nomon's child, and gives birth to a son who will lead her people. He is said to bear "the mantle of the heavens" meaning the blue skin of Natanatan which mimics the blue light of Nomon's moon. In the story, Nomon is a god however; that blue light is God's light, one that his son carries. We are also told that "that is why to this day, the people of Natanatan have skin of a faintly blue shade.": Queen Tsa's people bear God's Light to this day. The key difference between the two tales is how this is obtained: the Girl steals a piece of God's Light, whereas Nomon seems to have delighted in Tsa's company - that was no theft. The only victim in the tale of Tsa is Mishim; she is the one who is tricked by Queen Tsa, she is the one who experiences "Loss." (Oathbringer, 67) She experiences the loss of "Nomon's kindness" (Oathbringer, 67): the loss of her bond with her brothers. To experience loss is to have something taken away: the Girl steals God's Light; the Queen steals God's affection. So what is God's Light? What is this thing that The Girl/Tsa/the Heralds stole? It's pretty clear, given what Light is in the real (cosmere) world - Investiture. Bonds. Or, as a Rosharan might say, Surges. These two stories - taken as one tale about the Heralds - rhyme very well with in-world canon we know, which I alluded to earlier. Let's take the two stories, strip them of their figurative facade and see what we're left with. To recap: Queen Tsa = The Girl = The Heralds The World = The Village/land of shadows = Shinovar/minds of men creatures beyond the wall = ? = singers Nomon = God's Light = spren Nomon's son = Piece of God's Light = Surges Storms = Desolations Mishim = ? = ? So, the Heralds lived and led the humans Shinovar, and were strictly forbidden from venturing beyond Shinovar and their minds from Connecting with spren and accessing Surges. Despite the warnings of some of their peers, the Heralds decide to breach the barrier between men and spren. They trick Mishim (?) into helping them access the Surges. Mishim feels betrayed by the Heralds, and claims that they broke their word. The damage is done, and the barrier between the minds of men and the spren is broken. The Desolations start as a result of this. However, every Desolation brings back the light renewed* (in this case I believe it alludes to the fact that the Heralds return with each Desolation/storm). So who is Mishim in the cosmere, this mysterious being that allowed the Heralds to access the Surges (a piece of God's Light)? Where is she in the story of the Girl Who Looked Up? We know that Mishim was the victim of loss in Tsa's story, so we simply have to look for a similar victim in the Girl's story: who did the Girl steal God's Light from? There are 2 answers to that question. 1) God's Light ("girl in the scarves slipping up to the grand source of light, then breaking off a little piece in her hand." (Oathbringer, 82) 2) The creatures beyond the Wall (aka the singers) The second is the easiest to comprehend: it fits with what we know of the lore. The Heralds/ancient humans stole (in the eyes of the singers) the Surges/Connection to Rosharan spren from the ancient singers - this is the betrayal that started the Desolations. It also works if we insert the singers in the tale of Tsa: Mishim (the singer) is jealous of Tsa's connection with her brothers Nomon and Salas: "‘Feasting?’ Her siblings had never feasted with her before." (Oathbringer, 67) "‘Songs?’ Her siblings had never sung with her before." (Oathbringer, 67) "Mishim...now knew another mortal emotion. Loss." (Oathbringer, 67) Mishim is jealous of and betrayed by the human Tsa's Connection with Nomon in the same way the singers are jealous of and betrayed by humans Connection to spren, whose "meat is men" . Tsa offers Nomon companionship that Mishim cannot, singing and feasting with him - just as the humans offer what the singers cannot: "We can't provide what the humans lend" (Words of Radiance, 32) The first is a bit murkier, but also makes sense with cosmere mechanics. You might ask how you can steal from a being made of God's Light, or how a piece of that being could grant one Surges. But we do have sapient beings made of 'God's Light' (Investiture), with whom a Connection can grant access to Surgebinding: spren. How can these two answers coexist? How can the Heralds have taken the Connection to Rosharan spren from a spren and taken it from the singers? Simple: Mishim was a spren who represented the Connection between the singers and the spren. We know that such spren can exist from Rhythm of War, because that is exactly what the Sibling is: "My song...the common ground, the Sibling said. Between humans and spren. That is … that is why I was created." (Rhythm of War, 110) The Sibling is the child of Honor and Cultivation, made to be the emulsifier between humans and spren. If Honor and Cultivation created such a being for the humans, is it not possible that they did the same aeons before? Either that, or they found the spren already in existence - the singers being native to Roshar, it is possible that such a spren arose naturally. If it didn't, if this mysterious elder spren was indeed born of Honor and Cultivation, then the spren made by Honor and Cultivation to bridge the gap between spren and humans is not the only child - he is the Sibling. A last piece of evidence - the chapter with the tale of Queen Tsa is titled 'Mishim' and begins with this epigraph: "This generation has had only one Bondsmith, and some blame the divisions among us upon this fact." (Oathbringer, 67) We know now that this was the Sibling's Bondsmith, which seems appropriate for a chapter revealing lore about the character I believe to have been its predecessor. Let's turn back to the tale of Tsa and apply this new knowledge: at the end of the story, Mishim hears a new song which she recognises as the song of Nomon's child with Tsa . She feels loss - a spren that represents the Connection between singers and spren experiences the loss of light at the hands of the humans. This works perfectly as symbolism for the singers ancient loss and betrayal. However, it still leaves us with one final question: who is/was Mishim? Who was this great spren of Connection, that represented the Connection of the minds of the entire singer species to the spren? Hmmmm.... "Ba-Ado-Mishram...Connected herself to the entire singer species." (Rhythm of War, 73) "Ba-Ado-Mishram has somehow Connected with the parsh people," (Oathbringer, 80) 7) Mishram = Mishim The first and most obvious connection here is the similarity of the two names Mishim/Mishram. Beyond this, let's look at everything we know about Ba Ado Mishram from the books: i) The Heralds know Ba Ado Mishram personally: "please find Mishram and release her. Not just for her own good. For the good of all spren." (Rhythm of War, 97) NOTE: Kalak calls her 'Mishram', not 'Ba Ado Mishram' as the Fused, Sja-Anat and other Voidspren do. ii) She is consistently described as crafty/cunning/intelligent: "Ba-Ado-Mishram, who had granted forms to the singers during the False Desolation—were crafty and conniving." (Rhythm of War, I-2) "She is said to have been keen of mind, a highprincess among the enemy forces" (Oathbringer, 106) iii) She is trapped in a prison (the gem) and presumably wants to escape. Now lets look at how Mishim, the green moon is described: i) "the third moon is the cleverest." (Oathbringer, 35) ii) "she doesn’t want to be in the sky, sir. She wants to escape." (Oathbringer, 35) iii) "everybody knows that Mishim—the third moon—is the most clever and wily of the moons.” (Oathbringer, 35) iv) "Mishim is always looking for a chance to escape her duty.” (Oathbringer, 67) v) “Everyone knows that Mishim is the cleverest of the three moons." (Oathbringer, 67) vi) "The queen was pious, but the moon was crafty." (Oathbringer, 67) [NOTE: Ishar is famously pious, and less famously crafty] vii) “As always, Mishim was hatching a scheme." (Oathbringer, 67) I find it too much of a coincidence that two characters with such similar names are consistently described with the same language. Furthermore, the characterisation of Mishim as a kind of rebel fits with what we know of Ba Ado Mishram, who led the singers in the False Desolation without Odium and the Voidspren. It also explains how and why Ba Ado Mishram was able to Connect herself to the minds of the entire singer species during the False Desolation. Her having been the spren of Connection between singers and spren, it makes sense that she would retain this capacity - and that binding her in the way they did would have some adverse effects on the singers: "Yes. That terrible act touched the souls of all who belong to Roshar. Spren too." (Rhythm of War, 49) "By capturing Ba-Ado-Mishram—locking her in a gemstone—humankind had stolen the minds of the singers in ancient times." (Rhythm of War, 24) Even the language of the Recreance in this quote seems to echo the myth of the Girl: humans stole God's Light from the minds of the singers. And Mishram, "though still crafty, has never again left her place." (Oathbringer, 67) Conclusion So that's my theory. Ba Ado Mishram - once called Mishram - was a spren who represented the common ground between singers and spren. The Heralds communed with her to some degree, perhaps tricking her, and this let them access the Surges. This act violated the agreement between the singers and the human refugees (in the eyes of the singers at least) - this was the initial spren betrayal the Fused speak of. In retaliation, the singers went to Odium and became the Fused, sparking the first Desolation. The Heralds in turn went to Honor and forged the Oathpact to enable them to fight the Fused and seal them in Braize. During the course of the war, Odium was able to Unmake Mishram, God's Own Light, into Bad Ado Mishram. This is the great singer betrayal that the spren speak of, that led to many spren mimicing what Honor had done with the Heralds, and the beginning of the Radiants. Finally, it is possible that Mishram was actually the first born child of Cultivation and Honor, created specifically to represent the bond between singers and spren. Centuries later, when the spren started making human Surgenbinders, Ishar came to Honor to help force order upon them (making the Radiant orders). At this point, Cultivation and Honor had another child, this time made to represent the common ground between humans and spren. They made the Sibling. If you made it this far thanks for reading, can't believe I actually typed this whole essay and someone actually read it. Excited for y'all to tear holes in it it!
  13. So what do we actually know about what went down in Ashyn? All Stormlight Archive spoilers: Feel free to let me know if I just need to re-read SA to refresh my brain on the details haha
  14. *R.O.W. AND GREATER COSMERE SPOILERS/THEORY* So, in Oathbringer at the battle of Thaylen City, when Dalinar says “I am Unity” and opens Honor’s perpendicularity, Odium responds with “We Killed You!”. The popular theory seems to be that this is evidence of the division growing between the power-Odium- and the man who holds the shard-Rayse. After a 4th reread of Oathbringer and R.O.W., I now believe this to be what we will one day see as an obvious hint that Cultivation helped Odium kill Honor in an effort to one day unite not two shards as harmony has done, but all three of the shards of the Rosharan system and quite possibly begin the reforming of all 16 shards back into Adonalsium. My reasons are as follows; First, why I don’t believe “We Killed You” was talking about Odium/Rayse is discussed in the Mistborn series and Arcanum Unbounded. It’s stated multiple times that the man who took up the shard Ruin, Ati, was very different than the power he took up. Hoid goes as far as to say he was “a kind and generous man” before ascension. We know by the end he was much more the power than the man, as eluded to when kelsier says Ruin “dangles a puppet” towards Vin when he talks to her. This would imply that once the person who ascended loses control of the power it is not a “We” relationship but a complete shift in who controls who. Before they lose control of the power the person who holds the shard never says “We” because they don’t view holding the power as a symbiotic relationship but as an expansion of themself and it seems once the balance of power is tipped in favor of the power itself, the person who ascended loses complete control. Now on to why Cultivation helped kill Honor. When Sja-anat comes to Taravangian, the time he asks her to give him a way to summon Odium at a specific time, she says that perhaps Cultivation has been planning much more subtly than Odium ever suspected. Also stating that Cultivation had touched/changed three people. These people are Lyft, Dalinar, and Taravangian. As of the end of Rhythm of War, we know Taravangian has ascended to the shard Odium, and Dalinar has at-least begun to take up the remnants of the shard Honor. We know Lyft was altered to run her surge-binding on Life-Light, theoretically making her have a stronger connection to the power of cultivation than any other person on Roshar. At the end of that book we also see Cultivation come to T-Odium saying that there is much they need to discuss. Prior to to Taravangian’s ascension we hear Odium say to Dalinar, when agreeing to the contest of champions, that Cultivation would kill him if he broke his oaths, implying she already has or had the intent to kill a shard. The reason I believe she intends to unite the shards is two part. One part is a simple word drop. After Taravangian becomes Odium, Cultivation says that she believed he could “hold the shard of Odium with ‘honor’”. The other is slightly more esoteric. What have we seen so far of different unshattered shards and their intent and how it relates to the aspect of adonalsium they embody? To my knowledge, they coincide rather directly. Preservation? Preserve at all cost. Ruin? Entropy at all cost. So why would Cultivation seek to kill anything? Well I think it’s obvious. She told us exactly what she’s doing. The same thing she did to Dalinar. She’s not killing, she pruning. She helped shatter Honors power because it was her dandelion. She blew on the flower and flung seeds of Honor’s power across Roshar because she knew that neither she nor Honor could defeat Odium. But if he could be delayed, the powers transferred into imperfect vessel, Dalinar with his ties to Odium while trying to hold Honors power, Taravangian holding Odium’s Shard with his ties to Cultivation. And Lyft. A radiant-Honor-, who runs on LifeLight-Cultivation, and I believe Stormlight 5 will bring us Odium’s attempted corruption of Lyft, beginning with Moash/Burr’s murder of her fellow edgedancer at the end of R.O.W. and possibly concluding with the death of Gawx, The Prime, in the next book. Big theory with wild swings I know, but let me know if you guys know anything that directly contradicts any of this
  15. Okay so there's probably a lot of evidence that could disprove this. This is not a super well-thought-out or well-researched theory, this is a random thought i had the other day, that I wanted to share. We've heard many times that, in the time leading up to his death, Honor changed. He went insane. And we've kinda assumed that that change is cause of the power of the shard overtaking Tanavast, or at least I have anyway. But what if it wasn't? What if it was cause Honor was a different person? Why Nohadon? Well a couple reasons. Firstly, he's one of the few people we know who was alive long ago enough, and narratively I doubt Honor would have been taken up by some rando we never heard of. There seems to be something special about him, and his philosophy was clearly very significant to the knights radiant. Dalinar had that vision of him that didn't involve the stormfather, but couldn't have been just a dream or something since he revealed info to Dalinar that Dalinar didn't know. And I came across this quote recently, in a different thread on this forum, about how in Nohadon's days (which i think was before the days of the official Radiants, and bonds were more loose then, but i'm not completely sure on that timeline) about how he wanted spren to be more choosy about who they bonded. So it would make sense that he was the one to go on to create the radiants, to enforce this idea. So yeah, what do you all think of this theory? I'm sure there are many holes to poke in it, but it seems like it could make a lot of sense.
  16. Theory: After Ambition was wounded in the Threnodite System by Odium and Mercy, she fled to another point in space. This point either was, or became, the Rosharan system. Here, Ambition was killed. Her death created the Barrier Storm in the Cognitive Realm around the planet Braize. This storm was later Invested by Odium to create the proto-Everstorm that was pulled through into the Physical on Roshar at the Battle of Narak. Ambition's death also created a wound in the Spiritual Realm in the Rosharan System similar to that which exists on Threnody. This is the reason there are spren on Roshar. Datapoints: I group this into two categories, Spren and Storms. SPREN: From Shadows for Silence in the Forest of Hell, we know that the wounding of Ambition in the Threnodite System created Shades: cognitive beings which manifest in the Physical Realm. We do not see similar manifestations in the Mistborn novels or the White Sand graphic novels. We know there are no Splintered Shards in the Scadrian or Taldain systems at the time these stories are set. We see similar manifestations in Elantris and Emperor's Soul (Seons and Skaze). We know there are Splintered Shards in the Selish system at this time. We see similar manifestations in The Stormlight Archive (spren on Roshar) (and voidspren on Braize). STORMS: From Khriss's statements in Arcanum Unbounded, we know that the Dor around Sel is a whorl of free Investiture created when Odium Splintered Dominion and Devotion there. From statements from Nazh and Hoid, we know that travel to/from Sel through the Cognitive Realm is very difficult and dangerous due to the presence there of the Dor. From statements by Nazh, we know that that travel to/from Braize through the Cognitive Realm was difficult due to the presence of this Barrier Storm. A possible chronology: 1) The Shattering of Adonalsium. 2) Odium and Mercy clash with Ambition in the Threnodite System. Ambition is wounded. 3) Odium (and possibly others) clash with Ambition in the Rosharan system. Ambition is killed, creating the Barrier Storm, and spren. 4) Odium goes to the Selish system. He clashes with Dominion and Devotion. They are both killed, creating the Dor. 5) Odium returns to the Rosharan system, and begins whispering in the ears of the Ashynites. 6) The Ashynites devastate their planet using Dawnshards. They are taken in as refugees by Honor and Cultivation on Roshar. Their God, Odium, comes with them. 7) Honor, Cultivation, and Odium make a deal that they think will allow them to live in harmony on Roshar. This is the Oathpact. 8) Odium intentionally goes against the Oathpact, triggering its punishment prohibitions. He is exiled to Braize, on the far side of the Barrier Storm. The cycle of Desolations begins. 9) Honor is Splintered. 10) Honor's Cognitive Shadow is bound to the spren of the Highstorm. 11) Several millennia pass. 12) Odium invests a not-insignificant amount of Investiture into the Barrier Storm, creating the proto-Everstorm in the Cognitive Realm. This process takes several centuries. 13) Finally, the Everstorm is pulled through into the Physical Realm on Roshar, creating a direct passage between Braize and Roshar. Questions: A] Why is this wrong? B] Were other Shards involved in the death of Ambition? Did Mercy join Odium for the final clash? Did Ambition? Did Endowment (who we know is relatively new to the Nalthian system)? Indeed... were Honor and/or Cultivation in on the kill? C] Did the death of Aona and Skai occur before the initial conflict with Uli Da in the Threnodite system; after this initial conflict but before the final conflict in the Rosharan system; or after the Rosharan conflict? D] When on this timeline did Honor and/or Cultivation arrive on Roshar? E] When was Odium's first contact with the humans on Ashyn?
  17. Ok this one is a little crazy but here me out. A lot of importance has been placed has been place on Kaliden being called the son of honor/tanavast some have theorized that this means that he is the biological son or grandson of the vessel of honor but this make little sense unlike the Greek gods shards don't seem to have a body that can impregnate someone . They are much closer to the abrahamic form of divinity, however there is a abrahamic form of divine sonship. Now is there anything similar to the incarnation in the cosmere. Yes Avatars appear to function very similar to the biblical incarnation, How coincidental that we are first introduced to the concept of avatars in stormlight. Some other things to consider Kaliden is called storm blessed before he become a windrunner implying a pre syl connection to the highstorm. The storm father seems oddly interested in Kaliden, he rarely takes to humans other then Dalinar but has communicated several times to Kaliden. What do you think dose these make any sense even in a crazy sort of way.
  18. Brandon has stated in the past that a Shard's intent is filtered through the vessel, and the vessel can have an effect on how the Shard's intent is portrayed. My idea is that Honor's broad intent, without the filtering by Tanavast is that it wants to form Connections. We can see this in Surgebinding (an art which, while being of both Honor and Cultivation, seems to be mostly Honor) is initiated by forming a Nahel bond. I also remember hearing somewhere (although I don't remember where) that because Honor violated the pact the Shards made not to settle on the same world, that they mustn't have been clearly defined well enough. This seems to imply that Honor at least follows oaths and Connections by nature of its intent. If this is true, then I think it is a reasonable assumption that Odium, without the filtering by Rayse, is about severing Connections. If these both apply then I think that the method of initiation to becoming a Voidbinder requires you to severe a Connection of somekind. We also know that Voidbinding is usually related to the Unmade, so you might be able to come up with a more detailed theory including that. Note, I do not think that you necessarily have to break Radiant Ideals or severe a Nahel bond to become a Voidbinder, just that it requires some Connection to be broken.
  19. Hi all! Thought I would run this one by you, What if the Ten Fools (three of which we have names for) are real, and what if they are creations of Whimsy? Although we really know nothing at all about the Shard Whimsy, I feel that this is right up their alley- Honor creates his ten Heralds, and Whimsy sees their opportunity to parody these solemn and epically heroic individuals. Whimsy creates their own ten highly invested cognitive shadows, each of whom bears a comedic flaw in contrast to the mighty attributes of the Heralds. I am in love with the idea of these ten immortal, super invested, interstellar jesters. Spreading Whimsy, but not being all that helpful to the grand scheme of things. My ambition is to someday put this theory to Brandon to get his views on whether this has any merit. In the meantime, I really wanted to share it with you all! Thanks gang, stay silly
  20. Do we know what happened to Honor's shard? If he was killed should the shard be left behind? If I recall though it has been some time since I read The Final Empire, were Ruin and Preservation's shard left behind which allowed Saz to take hold of them? Sorry if this question has been asked, it just popped in my head.
  21. Lirin ought to be an important character in future books. Rosharan humans’ Shard, Honor, is essentially the personification of oath keeping. He could have been about honor in a broader sense, but his Intent ended up being primarily about oaths. Of all the people on Roshar, which one’s character is most aligned with this Intent? Lirin’s. He is the most oath-keeping man on Roshar. He keep his oaths to a fault. If Lirin lived on a different world, that would just be one interesting attribute among many. But on Roshar, this should influence his Connection to certain forms of investiture, and give him credibility among the splinters beyond the credibility that people generally earn by integrity. As I have written elsewhere, I think there’s some foreshadowing that suggests he will bond an honorspren. If that happens, I suspect it will be unintentional. It also seems like surgeons are about to become more importantly to the plot, as Kaladin is about to need to find a cure for the Heralds and hopefully for other mentally ill people. This is likely to put surgeons and Heralds together. One of the Heralds said his madness could be temporarily alleviated if a Radiant swore an oath near him. It would be odd for Mr. Honor-able Lirin not to have attracted the attention of one of Honor’s spren yet, except for two things: Lirin is a pacifist and Radiants fight, and the honorspren were refusing to bond. However, Rhythm of War established that Windrunners can protect by being surgeons and that Syl’s old Radiant used to use her generally for non-violent protection (digging storm shelters, iirc), raised questions about how surgeons might use shardblades (as stethoscopes, Kaladin suggested), and saw the honorspren persuaded that they could resume bonding Radiants. But even if Lirin doesn’t become a Windrunner, we have a character who is all about Honor’s intent who’s in a profession that is suddenly relevant to the plot. Brandon has also made Lirin an interesting, three dimensional character already. We have the makings of a very important character here, possibly a main character. I like Lirin, and I will be frustrated if Lirin doesn’t get screen time while he’s at this major crossroads of theme and plot. #MoreLirin
  22. Welcome one and all, as I invoke the most potent of muses: half-baked rambling! Part one: Ground work It's probably for the best if I lay down some basic premises that I'm working from for clarity. Premise one: all arcana found on Roshar are, at their root, emanations of the Surges. Surgebinding, Voidbinding, fabrials, the "even more esoteric" system that Khriss theorises in the Roshar essay, the powers of the Unmade, the forms of the singers and whatever else there might be. The possible exception is the Old Magic, which Brandon himself has called its own weird thing. Premise two: Odium is fully capable of granting access to all ten Surges, the lack of Adhesion Fused is deliberate on Rayse's part. It makes more sense to me that he'd just copy/access the existing framework of Surgebinding, rather than building his own, separate 9/10 of Surgebinding. Premise three: there are Physical, Cognitive and Spiritual manifestations of every Surge, as well as "Radiant" and "Voidish" expressions of the same. Part two: What was Rayse afraid of? What do mean by that? Under my interpretation, Rayse deliberately withheld Adhesion from the Fused, which seems odd. Why would he want his servants to only have access to nine of the Surges? Are Bondsmiths not proof that Adhesion can be an incredible boon to your forces? Even if they don't have access to the level of power of a Radiant Bondsmith, they should still have access to the same Adhesion abilities, just weaker. Having a couple of Fused who could act as walking batteries for the extremely Light-hungy Nex-im, for instance, feels like a great force multiplier. We can also infer that Odium can grant access to Adhesion, as a limited expression of it is the simplest explanation for the abilities of envoyform, making the lack of Adhesion Fused even more glaring. You might at this point be wondering why I claim that Rayse was afraid of something, only to blather about why it's weird that there are no Adhesion Fused instead. Worry not, I'll get to that. So, what do we know of Rayse's goals? Rayse wants to be the top dog in the cosmere and he wants to remain Odium. Rayse wants to be free to go on his murder rampage, so he does not want to Invest Odium anywhere, so as to not anchor him to a system. We can even track a possible modus operandi, as the Unmade are implied to have been something else in the past and several Voidspren show the telltale red of corrupted Investiture, which suggests to me that Rayse would typically twist existing things to serve him, rather than creating those things himself. We can also see this in his actions as tempter on Ashyn and his goal to make Rosharan humanity his army, after the cycle of Desolations has toughened them up enough. We also know that prior to the False Desolation and related events Roshar had two Pure Tones, after it had three. This implies to me that something that happened there Invested Odium on Roshar. Something we can guess didn't happen at Rayse's volition. Now, you might ask "why would being Invested be a problem to Rayse? Surely he'd not be morally conflicted at reclaiming any part of his that got Invested somewhere?" And no, I don't think he'd have a moral problem with taking back his power, but I don't think he can, or at least it's hard for him. As other people have already noted, for instance the thread speculating that Division is Odium's Truest Surge, Odium generally stands for something divisive, just as Honor can be seen as uniting. And yes, both can switch places, but hatred generally pushes you away from people and following some form of framework generally makes you part of a group. As just one example, we can see these thematic elements of Odium and Honor in the Surgebinders: Knights Radiant are a union of spren and humans (traditionally), working together to do things neither can do alone. Fused are solitary, forgoing even the normal relationship between spren and singer, as well as casting out the soul of the singer whose body they inhabit. And Odium's forces have other thematic divisions or separations as well: Most of the Fused have lost track of their original goal, being unlikely to relinquish rule to the common singers if they actually won. They are no longer fighting for their stated goal and are thematically separated from themselves. The former parshmen have been denied both the opportunity to make their own future and the ties they gained to the various national cultures of Roshar, they are separated both from their own self-determination and cultural roots. Moash/Vyre is very straightforward, he's separated from his emotions. The Unmade are separated from whatever they were before they were Unmade. And, while he's not known to be on Odium's side, Renarin's bond to an Enlightened spren sets him apart from normal Radiants. So, Odium is a (generally) separating force, so what? Well, that, along with the idiosyncracies noted by robardin, I believe, last week, points to that Odium might have a hard time reclaiming his Investiture. -Oathbringer, chapter 118 -Rhythm of War, chapter 112 -Rhythm of War, chapter 111 For all Rayse's threatening he apparently can't make good on the threat to force the Fused to stay away or to punish a traitor? It seems to be a lot of bluster. So what would Rayse be afraid of? Becoming Invested somewhere, hindering his murder-athon and, by extention, someone else being able to manipulate Odium's Investiture freely. Thus my conclusion is that Rayse wouldn't risk having Bondsmith-alike Fused, on the off chance that they'd so something Bondsmith-y, resulting in some of his power going where he doesn't want it. This might also be why the Everstorm doesn't infuse gems, though I do believe that Voidlight naturally cycles back to Odium, even if it can't be actively reclaimed. Also that Rayse seems like a blithering idiot for not following the Returned design philosophy, but then again, it's entirely possible he couldn't tweak that to run only on Voidlight, rather than Investiture over all. A side-note at the end of this is also that I think it could be possible that the Fused getting a passive and an active effect from their Light might be a conscious design descision on Rayse's part, as an attempt to make less of Odium's Investiture circulate. Part three: Unmade, Surges and cousinspren So, what's the deal? Well, there's this WoB: Which has of course had people trying to find which one maps to which Order, though note that Brandon says it's not a perfect match. I have personally thought that the Unmade should fill the Bondsmith spot, being parallel to the Stormfather and Nightwatcher. I'm fully prepared to accept that this might be the case, that bonding an Unmade produces a Bondsmith, even though the power of the spren itself isn't in the same slot. However, I recently encountered something that shifted my perspective and made me think that this might not be the case. Now, as I stated in part one, I believe that whatever the Unmade powers are, they fully fit within the context of the Surges. I also favour the cousinspren method of parallels, as each cousinspren seems able to manifest the primary Surge of the associated Radiant Order, e.g. windspren known to stick things together, a manifestation of Adhesion. (I do think that properly what I call the primary Surge would be denoted secondary Surge, as otherwise the Radiant Order that lacks a corresponding Fused Brand is Windrunners, not Bondsmiths. But I'm gonna use primary, since that's the order they're listed in.) Now, we need to be conscious of that there are three Unmade we don't really know anything about; Ba-Ado-Mishram, as all her Connection and Bondsmith-seeming shenanigans don't seem to have been a thing before the False Desolation, going by the Gem archive, that being her only known abilities makes it hard to line her up with anything, as it's apparently not her base powerset, Dai-Gonarthis, who is an almost complete unknown and Chemoarish who is much the same. That in mind, let's make a list! Windrunner/Surge of Adhesion Unmade: Yelig-nar I personally believe that Yelig-nar's ability to grant all Surges possibly comes from an application of Adhesion, similar to the Bondsmith ability to manipulate the Surges of other Radiants. He also fits thematically, being known as Blightwind. Skybreaker/Surge of Gravitation Unmade: BAM/Dai-Gonarthis/Chemoarish We have not seen the influence of any Unmade that I would assume uses a form of Gravitation, leaving only the three unknowns. Dustbringer/Surge of Division Unmade: Nergaoul Nergaoul's power could well be a Cognitive manifestation of Division, it both breaks down resolve and discipline and causes people to fight like individuals, not soldiers. Thematically the total loss of control of the Thrill is absolutely counter to the Dustbringer theme of self-mastery. Edgedancer/Surge of Abrasion Unmade: BAM/Dai-Gonarthis/Chemoarish Not much to say here, again I don't think an Unmade we've properly seen the influence of lines up. Thematically Chemoarish might fit, being known as Dustmother, but that is tenuous. Truthwatcher/Surge of Progression Unmade: Moelach Moelach's power to grant access to glimpses of the future might be a manifestation od the Surge of Progression, a Cognitive/Spiritual application of Growth, granting further access to the Spiritual at the Realmatic transition of death. Thematically Moelach grants access to looking at what can or will be, instead of the present truth of what is. Lightweaver/Surge of Illumination Unmade: Re-Shephir Shallan directly compares her to a creationspren, confirmed to be the cousinspren of Cryptics. Thematically she makes tangible darkness where Lightweavers make ephemeral light. Elsecaller/Surge of Transformation Unmade: Sja-anat Sja-anat changes spren, the most straightforward cause of which would be Transformation. Thematically she's also semi-present in both the Physical and Cognitive Realms, in addition, she's called Taker of Secrets, contrasting the scholarly characterisation of the Elsecallers, she aquires the knowledge of others rather than making new knowledge. Willshaper/Surge of Transportation Unmade: BAM/Dai-Gonarthis/Chemoarish The last Surge which no Unmade seems to have exhibited thus far, making it hard to guess. Stoneward/Surge of Cohesion Unmade: Ashertmarn Ashertmarn could be placed in a few different spots, and I myself have previously gone with Abrasion, but after some consideration I think that the power of the Heart of the Revel is possibly a Cognitive manifestation of the Surge of Cohesion, making people soft and pliable. Thematically the hedonism of Ashertmarn can also be seen as an inversion of the Stoneward theme of being where they need to be. Well, that took absolutely forever to type, if you made it here, thanks for reading. I hope it's all (fairly) clear and possible to follow, though I know I tend to ramble. Discussion both welcome and encouraged. ¤_¤
  23. We know Honor was splintered around the Recreance and that the Recreance was prompted by that generation of Radiants finding out humans were the real Voidbringers, and at that point Tanavast was overtaken by Honor's Intent and was also fighting Odium and so wasn't mentally stable enough to tell the Radiants that they were still morally okay. So what if the Radiants, having not a massive amount of guidance on how shards work, picked up on the fact he was fighting another god from his "ravings", and also noticed how he'd become obsessed with all oaths, good or bad and assumed that this was a consequence of the radiants existing. So what if they decided that they should break their oaths because they thought the oaths were what was draining Tanavast's sanity? Give just how powerful Surgebinding is, we can assume that 9/10 orders of radiant, with most of each type spren probably bonded, all releasing the Investiture they had (kinda) borrowed from Honor did something like in Warbreaker, where The Stormfather also backs this up: The Radiants didn't abandon their oaths because they thought they weren't in the moral right anymore, they abandoned their oaths because they were "try(ing) to protect the world".
  24. I have a theory: Two people will become the vessels of Odium, Cultivation and Honor, with Honor divided between the two of them. For instance, Dalinar might ascend to Odium and half of Honor, becoming an Odium-heavy shard of War. Someone else would ascend to Cultivation and the other half of Honor. Maybe Lirin would be Honor-vation, as he’s got Edgedancer vibes but is honorable to a fault. Each would be an active shard, unlike Harmony, especially War. War might be even more motivated to take over the cosmere than Rayse was, because of the Intent of the new shard. Cultiv-honor (can anyone come up with a real name?) would have the potential to be a very “good” Shard, depending on who the vessel is and how the two shards combine. I am only raising this as a possibility. I wouldn’t bet on it happening.
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