Search the Community

I don't know much about gems IRL, but it appears I definitely don't understand them in the context of Stormlight Archive either. Gems are basically the most valuable item in the entire series. They can be used for soulcasting, empowering Shardplate, containing Stormlight, and just plain old currency. They come in all sorts of sizes ranging from chip to gemheart. It is the size difference that is bugging me though. You have this massive gemheart, good for storing huge amounts of Stormlight and soulcasting large quantities of food or shelter, but that all ends the moment it shatters. OK, well does it all turn into dust? Wouldn't you wind up with thousands (I suppose) tiny pieces of gem that are essentially smaller gems and/or chips? Could you not put those into sphere and use them as currency? I figure they could be recut if that is the issue. I can't see why they wouldn't still hold stormlight if only in smaller quantities. The thought only came to me because I was wondering what would happen if someone cut into a chasmfiend and sliced the gemheart by mistake. Would it be such a clean break due to the use of a Shardblade that it was just two half size gemhearts? TL;DR - Why don't shattered gemhearts get recycled into smaller gems and chips for spheres?