Dai-Gonarthis and Emotion

[The Bookwyrm]

Rhythm of War spoilers ahead! Do not read unless you have finished it.

If someone has already posted this, or if it's intuitively obvious, sorry. 

This is from RoW, Chapter 8:

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"I've found a better way," Moash said. "I feel no guilt. I've given it away, and in so doing became the person I could always have become-if I hadn't been restrained."

And this is from Chapter 111:

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It had pushed away his Connection to Odium, forcing Moash to feel pain for the things he'd done-pain he didn't want. Pain he'd given away.

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He wasn't supposed to have to feel anymore. That was what he'd been promised.

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Odium's gift returned, and Moash breathed easier. Blissfully without guilt.

These quotes show me that somehow, Odium has the power to suppress, or take away altogether, emotion. I'm sure it has similar mechanics to Soothing with Allomancy, but on a much larger level.

But then there's this death rattle that makes me think there's something else:

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Let me no longer hurt! Let me no longer weep! Dai-Gonarthis! The Black Fisher holds my sorrow and consumes it! 

—Tanatesach 1173, 28 seconds pre-death. A darkeyed female street juggler.

This death rattle implies that the Unmade Dai-Gonarthis, a.k.a The Black Fisher, also somehow has the ability to suppress or take away emotion. And because the Unmade serve Odium, this makes me think:

What if the "gift" that Moash speaks of isn't directly from Odium? What if, instead, Dai-Gonarthis is the source of this ability to remove emotion, and Odium somehow delivers the power to Moash? This is something that has always seemed to fit for me. My theory is that Dai-Gonarthis is the source of Odium's ability to take away emotion.

The one problem with this theory is that because Odium is the god of passion, it would make sense for him to have this ability himself, meaning that Dai-Gonarthis may have similar powers, but isn't necessarily behind Moash's emotionlessness.

What do you think? What problems are with this theory? Was this already obvious? Tell me below!

[That1Cellist]

I think this is an interesting idea, though, seeing as Odium somehow unmade the Unmade in the first place, don't you think it would come from him originally anyway? I've always thought about the Unmade as almost being Odium delegating his power or investiture as a way to further his influence, since we know that shards can be everywhere, but they aren't exactly consciously aware of everything that goes on around them. So, Odium creates the unmade. They can do a bunch of jobs for him, and he doesn't necessarily have to directly manage it all the time. It's also entirely possible that the unmade are just leftovers of another plan to thwart Odium in the past, since we know they were something else at some point. 

I've always been curious about how Odium unmakes things in the first place. Sja-Anat made it sound as if Odium was unmaking her enlightened spren, but what exactly does that mean? Is it akin to voidbinding, almost like a part of it, or is it just another power that Odium has? What does it mean to be unmade? Are there multiple ways to unmake something? 

[CosmereMaths]

Is it possible Dai-Gonarthis had this ability before the unmaking. I’ve always viewed the unmaking as similar to Sja-Anat’s “enlightening”. It seems that enlightened spren are now a combination of Honor, Cultivation, and Odium rather than just honor and cultivation but I don’t know if the unmade are purely odium at this point. However this seems likely as odium likes to act through the unmade (he used the thrill to try and corrupt Dalinar)

[That1Cellist]

That is a good point, since we don't know really anything about the Unmade before they were unmade, so I suppose that their abilities could have predated their unmaking. I do find it unlikely that it left their abilities completely unaltered though. How much do we know about how enlightening works? It's not simply spren becoming self-aware, but what exactly does it do? Could it be taking the splinters of honor and cultivation, and then adding in some Odium as well? Is that what you were trying to say? What impact does this have on the spren? I think maybe a greater innate self-awareness, at least.

Edited June 29, 2022 by That1Cellist

[DiePie]

What I find most interesting is that Odium has said that Moash is something he's "never created before", which I always took to interpret as Odium never taking all of someone's emotions away before Moash. The other lines in the chapter seem to indicate that he hasn't done something similar to anyone else, or at least, that they haven't responded to it in a similar way.

So, yeah I think it's extremely likely that the Death Rattle is talking about Moash, but considering we haven't seen Dia-Gonarthis around him this seems like a book 5 or back half plot point.

[That1Cellist]

Could saying that Moash is something Odium "never created before" mean that Moash's relief from his emotion is directly tied to Odium, as opposed to Dia-Gonarthis? I don't know what kind of difference that would make, but it's still interesting. If we think that taking away emotions is the power of Dia-Gonarthis, then it's influence surely must have come upon others in the past, so it wouldn't make sense for Odium to say that unless there is something distinctly unique about Moash's situation.

[Returned]

18 hours ago, That1Cellist said:

Could saying that Moash is something Odium "never created before" mean that Moash's relief from his emotion is directly tied to Odium, as opposed to Dia-Gonarthis?

I'm not sure the distinction would be meaningful, though of course it could be. If you use a hammer to build something, we'd say that you built the thing using the hammer, not that the hammer did it. We don't know if Dai-Gonarthis is a more mindless spren, like the Thrill, or an intelligent spren like Sja-anat. But in either case it could be operating at Odium's behest or according to his designs. Even if Dai-Gonarthis is acting on its own, Odium might well think of it as his servant anyways, as Ruin thought of all people as his servants.

There is a lot about Moash's position that seems unique so far (in terms of the history of Desolations), like his high position among the Fused (which we know a human has never held before). I do think that you're right, OP, that Dai-Gonarthis is riding Moash though. His transformation seems extreme, though we also know that Odium asked Dalinar directly to give him (Odium) his (Dalinar's) pain. That could also have involved Dai-Gonarthis though, or not.