Confused about Final Empire history

[cometaryorbit]

In WoA, Tindwyl says that King Wednegon was one of the last to resist the Lord Ruler in any "meaningful combat". Yet his biography says that he blamed his defeat on the Deepness, saying that his kingdom's food stores were depleted so his people couldn't both grow food and fight the koloss. That would seem to imply that his defeat was at most a few years after Rashek's Ascension, and thus that Rashek/TLR ruled the entire remaining habitable part of the world within a few years.

But one of the HoA epigraphs says that "The Terris stewards resembled the servant class of Urtan, which Rashek conquered relatively late in his first century of life." Rashek was quite young when he took the power at the Well, so "late in his first century" must be at least 40-50 years post-Ascension.

And it's also stated that TLR kept the koloss away from civilization, using them to put down rebellions and conquer societies discovered on the islands... and that's stated in a way implying that this conquest of new islands has happened in comparatively recent times.

Is this a contradiction, or is Tindwyl making a distinction that Wednegon was the last who was thought to have had an actual chance (whereas Urtan and the islands, etc., were massively one-sided)?

"Societies discovered on the islands" also seems odd in another way, because since Rashek/TLR made all those intentional changes to the world - Ashmounts etc. - shouldn't he have a pretty good idea of what is in the remaining habitable area? Thus no real new "discoveries"? But maybe he didn't share his knowledge with the Steel Ministry, etc.?

[MasterGhandalf]

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Is this a contradiction, or is Tindwyl making a distinction that Wednegon was the last who was thought to have had an actual chance (whereas Urtan and the islands, etc., were massively one-sided)?

Considering the qualification "meaningful," I would assume that this is the case; Wednegon was the last (or one of the last) to be powerful enough to face TLR on something vaguely resembling even footing, while by the time of the later conquests he was powerful enough (with large enough numbers of koloss, allomancers and Inquisitors + conscripts from places he'd already conquered + increasing familiarity with his own abilities should he choose to take the field himself, etc.) that he was able to pretty much steamroller any and and all opposition. 

 

Considering it was Tindwyl who added the "meaningful," there may be some of her biases creeping in as well; ie Wednegon was one of the last whose resistance to the Final Empire was significant enough to impress her, personally. 

Edited March 6, 2022 by MasterGhandalf

[cometaryorbit]

That does seem likely; but OTOH it kind of seems like no one could possibly have had a chance. TLR chose who the first Allomancers were, and he created and controlled the koloss and kandra - and besides all that, TLR could probably have destroyed armies single-handedly anyway. All the magic was on his side.

Although, I guess Scadrial then was ~early 19th century tech, and koloss don't seem all that useful on a battlefield of that era (almost to the point that I kind of wonder why TLR created them, giving Ruin more tools). So if TLR or a Lerasium Mistborn wasn't personally present, it could be pretty even.

Another odd question: how did TLR create Inquisitors? The only Allomancers then were him and the nine kings he chose, and he'd just turned all the Feruchemists (except himself and Kwaan) into mistwraiths or kandra. So there would be no source of Allomantic or Feruchemical power-granting spikes.

Did he only design Inquisitors with the expanded mind/knowledge of the Well, but not create them until generations later?

[+Oltux72]

2 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

Another odd question: how did TLR create Inquisitors? The only Allomancers then were him and the nine kings he chose, and he'd just turned all the Feruchemists (except himself and Kwaan) into mistwraiths or kandra. So there would be no source of Allomantic or Feruchemical power-granting spikes.

Did he only design Inquisitors with the expanded mind/knowledge of the Well, but not create them until generations later?

Mistings did exist. I suspect the early bunches of Inquisitors were weaker.

[cometaryorbit]

13 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

Mistings did exist. I suspect the early bunches of Inquisitors were weaker.

Yeah, good point - there were 'Mist-snapped' Mistings like Alendi.

That raises another weird question: I guess TLR learned about what the Mists were when he took the power at the Well? But I guess not immediately, or he wouldn't have tried to move the planet and caused all the other problems he had to fix?

[Rashek's PR Manager]

On 2022/3/6 at 1:36 PM, cometaryorbit said:

Another odd question: how did TLR create Inquisitors? The only Allomancers then were him and the nine kings he chose, and he'd just turned all the Feruchemists (except himself and Kwaan) into mistwraiths or kandra. So there would be no source of Allomantic or Feruchemical power-granting spikes.

Did he only design Inquisitors with the expanded mind/knowledge of the Well, but not create them until generations later?

A possibility: TLR did have children, who could have strong Allomantic and Feruchemical powers. I can imagine the scenario that some of his children had rebelled against him so he killed them, whose powers were used to create the first inquisitors.

The WOBs concerning TLR's children:

 

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Questioner

So did the Lord Ruler ever have children?

Brandon Sanderson

Did the Lord Ruler ever have children? Yes he did.

 

 

 

 

Quote

 

Chaos

You have said the fandom puts too much emphasis on the Lord Ruler's children. Is that because the Lord Ruler suppressed his ability to pass on his abilities to them?

Brandon Sanderson

No.

Chaos

Brandon, that makes no sense. What? Now I'm even more upset. It's actually my fault, 'cause I keep telling people that the Lord Ruler's kids should be important, so you can blame me.

Brandon Sanderson

People can be important and not be cosmere-relevant.

Chaos

Yeah, but they'd be like super-powerful Mistborn!

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, who died nine hundred years ago!

Chaos

But he spent so much time getting Feruchemy away from Allomancy!

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, that's true.

 

 

Edited March 16, 2022 by Rashek's PR Manager
add sources

[+robardin]

Interesting point: Rashek's children - apparently conceived after his Ascension, for Brandon admitting they were "super-powerful Mistborn" - are also people who had "died nine hundred years ago"

His persecutions of the latent potential for Feruchemy in the Terris people must have begun a generation after his Ascension, as it's stated that he hadn't realized that would happen (i.e., he thought turning all living Feruchemists into mistwraiths at the time of his Ascension would wipe the slate clean). And he was evidently careful not to father children since then, as well, as he hasn't had children who died more recently than 900 years ago.

The implication is that originally, he (a) didn't realize Feruchemy could still arise in the Terris, and (b) may well not have realized that Allomancy would be hereditary as well (there not having been Mistborn at all until he made himself into one, and then also doled out some lerasium beads). I mean, what would he know about genetics and whatnot, he was a packman before all this!

And the further implication would be... That at some point, he persecuted his own descendants as well? Or at the very least, took... Steps to ensure they themselves did not procreate? Because in addition to being powerful Mistborn, they'd have been at least latent Feruchemists (if not Twinborn).

2 hours ago, Rashek's PR Manager said:

A possibility: TLR did have children, who could have strong Allomantic and Feruchemical powers. I can imagine the scenario that some of his children had rebelled against him so he killed them, whose powers were used to create the first inquisitors.

Killing his children might be tough even for Rashek (especially since it's a WoB that "Luthadel", the capital city of the Final Empire, was named after a person named "Lutha"... My head-canon being that that was the name of a woman, a pre-Ascension love interest, and thus likely mother to these first-generation, before-I-realized-that-was-problematic children)

However, turning them into Inquisitors? Which would make them superior to other men - DOMINANT? That I could see. And while Inquisitors are not physically incapable of procreating, one might imagine that the possibility is... Greatly diminished?

Edited March 16, 2022 by robardin

[cometaryorbit]

Huh. "Died nine hundred years ago" does imply that TLRs children were very early in his rule. Which makes way more sense... especially if we assume that TLR mistwraith-ified the Feruchemists to hide the information about Alendi and the Well.

I don't think we actually know that TLR started worrying about Feruchemy/Allomancy genes mixing that early.

5 hours ago, robardin said:

His persecutions of the latent potential for Feruchemy in the Terris people must have begun a generation after his Ascension, as it's stated that he hadn't realized that would happen

I think it was even later than that, but we don't know how much later. The Terris stewardship program was like sixth century, so theoretically it could have been even that late. Though I doubt it.

IMO it was probably around the time the Keepers were founded, second or third century?

It might have been Ruin's influence anyway, as I don't think natural Fullborn would be a real issue as the Feruchemy and Allomancy genes interfere.

Though maybe double gold Twinborn being around would have made TLR seem less divine.

Otoh I don't think TLR was super rational about this stuff... any Inquisitor who was a former Mistborn and got a f Gold spike could have learned Gold Compounding.

Hmmm...Did TLR immediately know of, and decide to pursue, the atium Compounding immortality trick? I can see a possibility where TLR at like age 25 decided to get married and found a dynasty like a regular king, then when he started to age was like "hey wait I can stay young forever".

[Rashek's PR Manager]

8 hours ago, robardin said:

Killing his children might be tough even for Rashek (especially since it's a WoB that "Luthadel", the capital city of the Final Empire, was named after a person named "Lutha"... My head-canon being that that was the name of a woman, a pre-Ascension love interest, and thus likely mother to these first-generation, before-I-realized-that-was-problematic children)

I like your head-canon! But wouldn't a pre-Ascension love interest, most probably a terriswoman, know of his true identity? What if she leaked the top secret? 

Ok this thread has reminded me yet agian how little we know when it comes to the history of FE. Even though it's no longer cosmere related, I still want to learn more about TLR's early reign.

[cometaryorbit]

Lutha could just as easily have been an early-post-Ascension relationship.

Although I'm realizing how little we really know about TLR's motivations early on - mostly just that he wanted to hide the truth about the Well, was worried about Feruchemy, and wanted to 'get vengeance' on nations like Khlennium.

I actually wonder about the 'posing as Alendi'/secrecy of his identity thing. Surely there were some people who had seen Alendi and later saw TLR and realized they weren't the same person. Sure, all Alendi's Feruchemist advisors were mistwraiths now, but Alendi was a king of multiple nations and a conqueror - he must have had subordinate rulers and generals/officers (maybe TLR killed them all eventually, but trying to kill off everyone who had seen Alendi would be really suspicious in itself).

I'm sure TLR never came out and said "oh yeah I killed Alendi", but the fact that he wasn't Alendi might not have been all that secret in the first generation, to the point that he'd be worried about his wife or lover knowing the secret. Maybe he told those in his government who knew Alendi that Alendi had been killed & he had to finish the task?

Edited March 17, 2022 by cometaryorbit