Theory on who can burn Atium

[Clowd]

So I do not know if this has been discussed at all, but here's a theory I have about Atium. This is my first time trying to come up with a theory, and I'm finding it difficult to type out something that feels slightly intuitive.

Theory: "Any Misting can burn Atium. There is no such thing as an Atium Misting"

I came to this conclusion because the events at the end of HoA do not make sense to me in light of the full Table of Allomantic Metals. At the end of HoA, they give as many allomantic metals as possible to each member of Elend's army that fell to the mist sickness, which was 16% of his army. It was also determined that each approximately 1% was a Misting of a different metal. They didn't know about Chromium or Bendalloy, but they knew about Atium and Malatium, which they erroneously thought were one of the 16 metals. So if Atium is not one of the base 16 metals, and the mist sickness only created Mistings of the base 16 metals, then Atium could not possibly be one of those metals. Therefore, there could not be such a thing as an Atium Misting.

However, Demoux, Yomen, and about 280 other soldiers in Elend's Army, were shown to be able to burn Atium in HoA. They had all suffered from Mist Sickness (I forget about Yomen though, I think it was beat out of him). Given this, it seems that any Misting can burn Atium.

Thoughts? I hope I wrote this through clearly, it's my first time trying to put things like this into words. If this has already been discussed, please feel free to point me to that thread and close this one.

[Deus Ex Biotica]

I am reasonably certain that if an advantage as strong as Atium were available to everyone, people would have learned this in the intervening 1,000 years.

[Bremen]

I am reasonably certain that if an advantage as strong as Atium were available to everyone, people would have learned this in the intervening 1,000 years.

I'm not so sure. TLR kept a tight control on what was "known". Outside of the priesthood atium mistings were unknown. In part because of how expensive it was. It is also noteworthy that Malatium was unknown until Kelsier discovered it, yet theoretically every allomantic metal should be able to be alloyed with atium.

[Thor]

So I do not know if this has been discussed at all, but here's a theory I have about Atium. This is my first time trying to come up with a theory, and I'm finding it difficult to type out something that feels slightly intuitive.

Theory: "Any Misting can burn Atium. There is no such thing as an Atium Misting"

I came to this conclusion because the events at the end of HoA do not make sense to me in light of the full Table of Allomantic Metals. At the end of HoA, they give as many allomantic metals as possible to each member of Elend's army that fell to the mist sickness, which was 16% of his army. It was also determined that each approximately 1% was a Misting of a different metal. They didn't know about Chromium or Bendalloy, but they knew about Atium and Malatium, which they erroneously thought were one of the 16 metals. So if Atium is not one of the base 16 metals, and the mist sickness only created Mistings of the base 16 metals, then Atium could not possibly be one of those metals. Therefore, there could not be such a thing as an Atium Misting.

However, Demoux, Yomen, and about 280 other soldiers in Elend's Army, were shown to be able to burn Atium in HoA. They had all suffered from Mist Sickness (I forget about Yomen though, I think it was beat out of him). Given this, it seems that any Misting can burn Atium.

Thoughts? I hope I wrote this through clearly, it's my first time trying to put things like this into words. If this has already been discussed, please feel free to point me to that thread and close this one.

I actually had a similar idea, though I thought anyone could burn Atium, buuuuttttt...Brandon has specifically said that the Inquisitors would spike the drinks at noble parties with Atium and then cause a commotion to get any unknown Seers to instinctively burn Atium. (The arrival of any Inquisitors was usually enough of a commotion.) They would catch them burning the Atium with a Seeker Inquisitor and then blackmail/coerce/recruit the Misting into joining the Canton of Inquisition. Here is the quote from the Brandonology: (The specific question is about 2/3 of the way down the page. Search for "Atium Misting" and you should find it.)

1) They spike the drinks at one of the nobility's balls with trace amounts of Atium, then cause a bit disturbance. (Often, the Inquisitors themselves arriving will do it) and burn bronze and watch for brief pulses. The body will burn metals instinctively if it can, which has been shown quite often in the series. This is also how they get a lot of their secret information about who is a Misting and who isn't. It's not a perfect method, since you have to watch for Copperclouds messing things up, but it is effective once in a while.

Any time an obligator who is not a Misting joins the Ministry, he is unknowingly given a larger chunk of atium and then forced into a series of rituals that will drain him physically and get the body to react and burn the metal. This was how Yomen was discovered.

[Eerongal]

There's such things as atium mistings. We call them seers. After a quick google search, i can point you to here in the annotations of HoA where brandon talks about atium mistings.

Also: i'm moving to the mistborn board since its more appropriate there than in general theories.

[Clowd]

Well then I'm quite confused about the nature of the mist sickness. I thought it could only create mistings of one of the 16 base metals, and that Atium was an anomaly. Maybe TLR kept info from the inquisitors so they didn't fully understand the nature of Atium? It just seems to be a discrepancy to me, hence why I'm thinking that there's something more to Atium Mistings than is initially implied despite what Brandon has said so far.

[Deus Ex Biotica]

The Mist Sickness was direct intervention from Preservation. I'm reasonably sure he could fudge the rules, at the expense of a small measure of his power.

[CrazyRioter]

yeah I'm pretty sure Preservation messed with the rules at some point.

[Eerongal]

i'm pretty sure the mist sickness wasn't CREATING mistings, it was just snapping them.....

Also, yeah, the mist sickness was direct intervention by preservation. I'm not sure what sort of implications this has in what he could actually do to turn the tides.

[Joe ST]

iirc also TLR fudged the metals table up to make atium a 'base metal' didnt he?

[happyman]

The Mist Sickness was direct intervention from Preservation. I'm reasonably sure he could fudge the rules, at the expense of a small measure of his power.

This. Note especially that in the massive chess game that was the history of Scandriel from the creation of humans to the end HoA, having all the Atium burned was Preservation's next-to-last move. It was the set of Pawns that stopped the enemy queen (e.g. Marsh) from being able to checkmate before Preservation's game-winning moves, in the form of Vin's counter-attack and Sazed's ascension. Preservation paying special attention to this little detail, and taking care of it well in advance, makes sense.

[Alliare]

This makes me think...

Why would Ruin's body manifest in a way that can be used by Allomancers if Allomancy is of Preservation?

That and... well, anyone can burn Lerasium, right? Or is it that you just "eat" it, not "burn" it? Because it's the key for Allomantic powers. And, then, it depends on your DNA if you can burn one metal or every one of them... and one of them is Atium. But that would be giving Preservation's tools a way to end with Ruin's physical manifestation... whilst it would seem like more logical if Preservation couldn't affect Ruin directly through allomancy.

So why can Atium be allomantically used in the first place?

[Deus Ex Biotica]

Lerasium is "a metal that anyone can burn." Apparently it has a function other than giving people Allomancy (or increasing the Allomancy of those who already have it), but we do not know what this is.

Atium being usable in Preservation's arts raises some interesting questions. I think it is because, ultimately, both come from Andalsium. In any event, it implies that Lerasium could be used to make spikes. What these spikes would steal is unknown, though stealing the other person's connection to Preservation as a whole (and, thus, all the powers of a Mistborn at once) seems like a solid bet to me.

-- Deus Ex Biotica

[Argent]

Both Ruin and Preservation can fuel all three Metalic Arts. In their minds it's all the same, I think - Allomancy, Feruchemy, and Hemalurgy are just three of the aspects of the power of creation all Shards share.

Also, the Allomantic table Brandon released a while ago describes Atium and Larasium as such:

• Atium: Pure atium grants the Allomancer an expansive vision of the future and enhances their mind to accept, process, and hold more information. In alloy, it produces various expanded Mental and Temporal effects.
• Larasium: Pure Larasium transforms a person into an Allomancer or drastically improves their Allomantic powers. In alloy form, it produces various expanded Physical and Enhancement effects. (Including the creation of Mistings).

Just for reference, the four categories of effects mentioned above refer to the following groups of metals:

• Mental - Zinc, Brass, Copper, Bronze
• Temporal - Cadmium, Cerrobend, Gold, Electrum
• Physical - Iron, Steel, Tin, Pewter
• Enhancement - Chromium, Necrosil, Aluminum, Duralumin

So Ruin is more related to the first two, and Preservation - on the last two... Whatever that means.

[Arcanist Lupus]

iirc also TLR fudged the metals table up to make atium a 'base metal' didnt he?

I believe that was Preservation, but yeh. Brandon said somewhere that Preservation removed Cadmium and Bendalloy from the table in order to keep the whole "16" theme going without confusing anyone too much.