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Had to related what-ifs that may be possible and I'm not sure yet on the scope of the ramifications. What if Returned had a security phrase known to Endowment and anyone that she decided to divulge that information to? What if Nightblood or Azure's sword had security phrases? What would or would not be possible? Did Shashara have more control over Nightblood as the Awakener, or did Nightblood operate about as we've always seen? Thoughts? If these are possible there could be some pretty terrifying reveals.

It's been mentioned by Brandon that Vasher has a way of getting Stormlight into himself that's different from how Squires, Radiants, and people with Honorblades do it, and that's how he's keeping himself alive on Roshar. I have a theory about how he does it. So, my first thought upon seeing this was that he swallows the gems. A bit blunt, but we see that in Mistborn, having at least a part of something inside you makes the object act as though it were Invested due to your Spiritual Aspect. That idea went out the window nearly as soon as I'd thought of it. Swallowing the sphere doesn't suffuse its Investiture into your soul, which is required for what Vasher is doing. Besides, things in your body resist Invesiture more because the presence of your SA is interfering, rather than the object becoming part of your SA. After that, I landed on a much better idea. Vasher can, as a Returned, have access to the first 5 Heightenings whenever he pleases. One of those Heightenings is perfect pitch. What if Vasher collects a mound of Stormlight-Infused spheres, then sings Honor's Pure Tone, loud or intense enough to the point that Stormlight actually leaves the spheres and enters his body? That way, the Investiture will have actually entered his body and soul properly, which he could feed on to stay alive, and it's something regular people can learn (As evidenced by Navani). It seems to tick all of the boxes Brandon outlines in the WoB. I have some questions though. Would having Stormlight in your body that way trigger Stormlight healing, even a bad version of it? If a Scadrian learned to replicate this, could they burn the Stormlight similar to the Unkeyed Dor in TLM as a hyper-efficient replacement for metals without needing a Spren bond?

On at least some parts of Nalthis, Returned are seen akin to vampires, draining the life from the living to sustain themselves. We know that Returned appear more in accordance with how they see themselves and how society sees them (WoB and other WoB), so would one of these Returned be less like a superhuman in appearance and more like an actual vampire? Plus, the whole increased physical speed and strength lends to the vampire theme as well. Now I actually really want to see Returned from other cultures on Nalthis and how they are different from the Hallendren Returned.

Here's a hypothetical scenario: you're a Returned who is Cosmere aware, but has been kicked off of Nalthis. Permanently. How do you find Investiture to feed off of? And yes, Stormlight from Roshar is the easiest way, so let's say that you also somehow managed to get kicked off of Roshar by Cultivation as well. Does anyone have any ideas as to how they could obtain other sources of Investiture to feed off of? Here's a few of mine: 1. Go to Scadrial, learn about Hemalurgy and drop all your morals (or become a vigilante and only become morally grey- another word for dropping all your morals ). Proceed to Hemalurgically spike someone, then feed off the Investiture as it seeps out of the spike. Basically become a Cosmere vampire. 2. Go to Scadrial and convince the Malwish you are the Sovreign and get them to create Nicrosilmind Medallions to feed you as you please. 3. Go to Sel- don't get vaporized by the cognitive plasma-storm along the way- and find a Forger to rewrite your past to say you never died. Then consume the Investiture from the Forgery. Reapply Forgery as needed. 4. Go to Sel, find Elantris, beg a bit of AonDor from a charitable Elantrian and become their servant for the next two hundred years as they sustain you. 5. Go to Taldain...realize that all you need to do is sunbathe on Dayside. If that doesn't work, eat White Sand and hope for the best.

Let's say you're holding a thousand Breaths, then you do something stupid and get ded'ed. Then Endowment flips a coin or rolls a dice or whatever and decides to rez you. What happens to the Breaths you were holding? Do you still have it and thus won't die in a week or does it disappear?

So I just had a crazy thought that I'll probably turn into a Fanfic one day, could Endowment Smite someone then immediately Return them? And manipulate their Vision so that they'd see only what she wants them to see? I'm just thinking about if Endowment decides to get involved with the greater Cosmere, this could be one way to do it, with an army or a whole organization of Returned loyal to her, doing her bidding across the Cosmere. Of course, this probably won't happen but still, I think it's worth thinking about.

Do you guys think a kandra could Return in Nalthis? Would this restore the kandra to their original human form if they haven't been a kandra for long enough? If they have been a kandra for thousands of years and the Return keeps them that way, what would happen? Would they still need spikes to stay sane? Would they still need bones (Returned have some control over their shape)? I would like to know what kind of resonances would happen, in your opinion, or if it's even possible.

If a Returned were to be transformed into a Steel Inquisitor, would the minor physical alterations made to their body by having so many spikes (greater height and a gravely voice) be possible to negate by their own perception of self?

Is a Returned's soul or Spiritual aspect made up of their Divine Breath, or is it attached to but still separate? If their Spiritweb is separate, could you use Hemalurgy to staple their Cognitive Shadow back into their body after they gave up their Divine Breath?

If someone died heroically, was made into a Lifeless immediately, and then Returned... what would happen? Is this possible?

If a Returned dies in a heroic way, can they Return again?

If an Alethi were to travel to Nalthis, get some Breaths, die and then Return, would their already absurd height be increased even further?

Been meaning to ask this to Brandon directly, but then I realized I could probably just post it here and get some great feedback! Does the process of Returning affect the subject's Identity (in the realmatic/investiture sense)? If, hypothetically, a feruchemist were to store something in a metalmind, then died and Returned, would they be still be able to tap that same metalmind? Or would their Identity have changed, making them essentially "unkeyed" from it? Similarly, if a Returned became a feruchemist and stored something, would that metalmind be inherently unkeyed?

So I had a thought while answering another thread. I wonder if Returned could heal injuries by thinking them away. We see Vivenna altering her personal appearance including adding a scar to her face as a disguise. The scar goes away once she drops the guise, so adding and removing that kind of "injury" is within Vivenna's and presumably Vasher's abilities. I wonder if a Returned could convince themselves that they hadn't been injured even though they really had, if they could heal themselves by reasserting their perception of a undamaged body. We see Kelsier's Cognitive Shadow get beaten up until he's on the ground expecting broken bones, but the pain is a function of his mind thinking he should be hurt. Would this be something only a Returned or one of their descendants could do? Any thoughts? It's made me wonder for a while now that the Investiture specifically noted to be tied to life is the worst at healing, with the only major case being when a Returned uses their Divine Breath to heal someone. For crying out loud Vasher deliberately dumps BioChroma into people he intends to immediately kill.

I believe that there is a WoB states that one of the reasons the Returned feed on the Breaths of children rather than older people is so that they have more vitality from that Breath (I couldn't find it, I'm sorry). Theoretically, could a Returned consume more investiture than was just necessary for their survival, and somehow be expanded in their power by doing so? I don’t mean by collecting more Breaths on top of their Divine Breath, but if they actually “ate” the extra investiture. Would this be similar to larkin, and how they seem to grow after consuming large quantities of investiture?

My brother and I were contemplating different theories for the Cosmere, two steps away from donning full tinfoil hats when he said something that I hadn't thought about. We were discussing Navani and what's next for her, trying to think about things that were repeated throughout RoW. A problem that Navani has is that she isn't a singer, so she has to really work at getting the correct pitch with Raboniel. Right before this, we had discussed Zahel and how Brandon had mentioned that he will get to what Zahel was doing - prompting me to ask the question "But why is Zahel is Roshar of all places, from a literary standpoint?" ... then he said it - Is the endgame for Zahel to, one way or another, end up giving Navani his breaths - thus enabling her to obtain perfect pitch? Sorry if that has been mentioned before, it was an "OH GOD" moment for me, and wonder if anyone else has anything to add to supplement, or debunk, this theory. Thanks!

I've recently reread Warbreaker, and I've been wondering why the Returned can't have children. After all, some of their other physiological functions, like muscle movement and blood flow (eating and sleeping aren't necessary (which reminds me; do the Returned go to the toilet?), for some reason) still work. So why can't they have kids? Well, it could be to do with the fact that pregnancy requires sperm cells to ferment egg cells, and for the zygote to implant itself into the womb, which takes a while to occur. So, could it be that for a Returned can't have children because their reproductive cells die before the zygote can implant itself in the womb? If the sperm/egg cells run out of Breath before the zygote reaches the womb walls (I don't know the technical term), it would die, so the woman, Returned or otherwise, wouldn't get pregnant. This would still allow for Returned or their partners to become pregnant; it would either require the sperm cells to already have some amount of Breath (which would be why care whether or not Siri had sex with Susebron; she could still get pregnant since Susebron had a lot of Breath on top the one that allowed him to Return), or for the zygote to be given a Breath before it would consume the breath that allowed it to Return, which would give it time to impregnate the woman. But, for the first theory to work, there must clearly be some level of uncertainty in whether the woman would get pregnant. Otherwise, why would some of the Godkings before Susebron (the one that appears in Warbreaker, not the ones before him) not have had children? Of course, it could have been that he (the Susebrons before the one in Warbreaker) or his wife was infertile, but I find that unlikely; he could have just remarried. I think the amount of Breath the sperm or egg cell holds is proportional to its size compared to the rest of the body; tiny. Each sperm or egg cell would only hold a trillionth of what the total body holds, an extremely tiny amount. The cell could easily consume it, and then go on to consume the Breath that made it Return. However, that is the amount that the whole body consumes, not the amount that those cells consume. So, the amount that the cells would consume would also be extraordinarily small. However, only the Godking gets more than one Breath a week, so only he would be able to get his partner (in this case Siri) pregnant. So, that would explain why Susebron, but not other Returned, can have children; they simply don't have enough Breath. But, for fun, I still want to calculate just how much Breath Susebron currently holds. So, assuming he gets 3 Breaths a week, of which he consumes 1 (per week), he would receive a net total of +2 Breaths a week. 2 Breaths per week x 52 Breaths in a year x 52 years (Warbreaker says around 50, so I'm going 51/2) = 13,520. He also has the store of 50,000 Breaths that is passed down from Godking to Godking, which makes it 63,520 Breaths. Add that to the Breath that allowed him to Return, which is equivalent to about 2,000 ordinary Breaths, and he has a grand total of 65,520 Breaths! So, even without the 50,000 Breaths that was given to him when he was born, he has enough to reach the Eight Heightening, allowing him to Break Commands. This is far from the 50,000 he needs to reach the Tenth Heightening, but even this is far more Breath than most throughout Nalthis' history have ever held. I don't know that much about pregnancy, so I could well be extremely wrong. If you know more, please correct me!

When a Feruchemist taps their metalmind, I'm pretty sure that their weight doesn't change, even though their muscle mass does. When a Returned shrinks or grows, does their mass/weight stay the same?

All people have a Cognitive Aspect which is formed of Investiture (as technically everything is). Upon death this Aspect begins to dissipate, just as the body begins to decay. An infusion of Investiture to the body will heal it and an infusion of Investiture to the Cognitive Aspect will maintain it. Living people are effected by other people’s perceptions. The effect is simply minimized for unknown reasons. In contrast, the Cognitive Aspects of objects and non-sapient creatures do not have whatever safe guard minimizes this effect on living sapients and are strongly effected by perceptions. Shadows seem to fall into an in between area. They’re less effected by perception than non-sapients, but they’re more effected than living sapients. Whatever safeguards living sapients appears to be damaged, though a strong enough infusion of Investiture or exposure to the Spiritual Realm may help. What’s even more interesting is that there’s some indication that the whole problem is tied to memory and the limits of human capacity for it. It’s possible memory is the safeguard. There are some indications that an ordinary living sapient who lives too long will begin to have the same issue as a Shadow. And others that indicate natural immortals may avoid the issue. It’s also worth noting that Vessels seem to have a similar problem and some take advantage by trying to shape perceptions of themselves in particular manners. (Note that most Vessels are alive.) To me this indicates that the problem is less of perception and more a matter of Spiritual Connection. If the body is the physical function, and the Cognitive is the consciousness, it seems like the Spiritual is the totality of our lives experiences: the web of memories and connections we form throughout our lives that define who we are. It seems to me that as the Cognitive Aspect reaches its natural threshold for recall, it begins to lose its ability to access portions of that web, almost like a magical version of Alzheimer’s disease. It’s as though the Connection between Consciousness and Experience begins to fray, leading to the weakening of the Self. I’m going to call this the recall threshold: the point past where a Cognitive Aspect can access the sum totality of its Spirit Web. If something happens to expand the Cognitive Aspect’s ability to ‘recall’ or if something stimulates this, the Cognitive Aspect will ‘remember’ itself. In the absence of a whole link to the Spiritweb, I think perception takes its place. That’s a type of Connection too, but it’s one formed by the collective experiences and memories of other people. If you don’t know who you are, then you have to take it from other people. Imagine someone with amnesia, being told ‘You are X. You work as a Y. This is your family.’ etc. and determining who you are based on that. Except on a much broader and unconscious scale. In this hypothesis, as the ties from the Cognitive Aspect to the Spiritweb fray, the collective Consciousness, the perceptions and Connections of and with other people, act to shore up the fraying supports. Over time, as the ties between Realms continue to weaken, this collective consciousness becomes a pseudo-Spiritweb shaping the way the Cognitive Aspect defines itself while still allowing that self to maintain some definition. This has little to do with whether it’s the original person, or soul, or not. It’s not a problem of perception - indeed, perception would actually be acting as a symptom reducer - but a problem of Connection between Realms. The problem that Shadows face would simply be a result of those ties being damaged by having died. Just as a person loses their Connection to the Physical, they also lose their Connection to the Spiritual upon death. When a Shadow has their Cognitive Aspect stabilized, it stops the severing process and may even reverse some of the damage. But it seems reasonable that these Connections between Realms are no longer whole. The Connection to the Physical, for example, needs to be intentionally restored. If the tie to the Spiritual remains damaged, then it would be more vulnerable to breakdown than that of a living sapient. So while both living and Shadow will experience the recall threshold problem, a Shadow will experience the effects much sooner. This effect would apply to all Shadows over time. In fact, it would apply to all non-natural immortals. Even natural immortals could, in theory, eventually hit their (presumably much higher) recall threshold and experience the effects of the loss of Spiritual Connection. In conclusion, whether or not a Shadow is the original person’s consciousness/soul is immaterial and remains a philosophical problem (as per WoB). The problem is one of Realmatic Connection that would ultimately effect all sapients, with the closest Physical Realm equivalent being something like Alzheimer’s or other disorders of memory. The fact that increasing the recall threshold or decreasing the distance between Realms can heal this damage would be indicative of this problem not being tied to original personhood of a Shadow, but to a greater Realmatic effect to which Shadows are simply more susceptible due to their weakened ties to the Realms.

The standard method of feeding the Returned is to give them Breaths, but those are expensive and can be used for other purposes, such as gaining the heightenings. What are some other ways to feed Returned? Here are some I came up with: granting them Allomancy so they can feed on Preservation’s investiture, granting them access to Feruchemy so they can feed off their own efforts, giving them an Unsealed Metalmind, taking the investiture from a Shardpool via aluminum. Are there any other ideas on how to feed them (aside from stormlight)?

Hello everyone, first Topic Post from me, As I reread Warbreaker, I came across the few pages where Vasher explains to Vivenna how little they knew about Awakening and the Commands that exist. A thought then occured to me and I haven't been able to find much about it. Could there be a Command that exists that transfers a Returned's breath to someone else like a regular breath, and we simply don't know what exactly it is? I did read a WoB saying that when a Returned gives up their breath, it turns to "Kenetic Investment", so it physically and mentally heals the recipient, but is that because that's the command that's being used? Or is it because that's just how Returned Breaths can only be used? I also read a WoB that said that it is mostly based off of what you're visualizing in your mind, so I'm not sure if it means that the Returned can only visualize healing the subject as they say the command since it typically is why they came back. I might have over thought this one, but I'd like to know if it's already been answered.

In the Hallendren court of Gods, the Returned seem to be able to get away with a lot of things without punishment, because it would be rather difficult for the priests to justify disciplining them, I would imagine. But what if they did something truly horrible? Killing a normal human being would be bad enough, but with their station, they could likely still get away with it. But killing one of their fellow Returned? What would the priests do in such a situation?

This is mostly a musical musing and I don’t expect much discussion but if there are any music theory nerds out there, come on in! So, I’m guessing most Returned (and people at the Second Heightening) would abhor music us normal people make because they would hear it “out of tune.” I want to take it a step further though. Modern pianos are tuned with what’s called Equal Temperament, meaning that all keys are just a little off, as opposed to one key sounding beautiful with some of the others sounding terrible. The discrepancy comes from the fact that 2^(1/12) is not rational. My question is would a Returned hate all modern piano music? How sensitive is their Perfect Pitch?

If a Returned had a form of psychosis that made them sincerely believe that they are, or ought to be a lizard when they were alive, would they return as a lizard?